


The Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

by LeoOtherLands



Series: All the Broken Pieces [15]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Cutting, Explicit References to Toture, Gen, Hurt No Comfort, If you're looking for a happy ending look somewhere else, Moral Dilemmas, Platonic Relationships, Professional relationships, Rare Characters, Unpleasant Mission Assignments
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-16
Updated: 2020-01-16
Packaged: 2021-02-27 08:20:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 27,708
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22273969
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LeoOtherLands/pseuds/LeoOtherLands
Summary: “I… am Iryō-nin, Monga-sama; I have no enemy but suffering."“Sure, kid,” he muttered. “Whatever you say.”Kitō is a medic nin, and he knows what it means to live and die by the rules of the Iryō Butai. But, how does one live by the rules of healers in a world waging war?
Relationships: Kito (Naruto) & Monga (Naruto), Kito (Naruto) & Yamanaka Inoichi
Series: All the Broken Pieces [15]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1386661
Comments: 8
Kudos: 10





	The Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

**Author's Note:**

  * For [decaf_kitty](https://archiveofourown.org/users/decaf_kitty/gifts), [EternalSurvivor](https://archiveofourown.org/users/EternalSurvivor/gifts).



> Well, here is several month of my life. Given this fic's unexpected length, it's only to be expected, I suppose. In any event, who is ready for some super long notes to go with a exceedingly long story? First, this work is very loveingly for two wonderful people, decaf_kitty and EternalSurvivor.
> 
> Decaf dear, this is for you, once more, in recognition of the fact something you wrote inspired me and sent me off writing about a certain medical nin and windows. That might seem like a small thing, but it isn't to me. Not when Kito has become something meaningful and deeply needed in my life. There are a few characters I claim as my muses in this existence, and Kito seems to have taken up residence as one of them, beside a certain capricious clown man... This gift isn't enough to express how much that means to me.
> 
> Eternal, my dearest, my darling. How could this story not be for you? I always meant to give it to you, and I hope you don't mind the gift. There isn't anyone who deserves it more. I am still in awe of whatever chance brought you into my life, and I don't know what I did to deserve having you here with me. You were just there one day, being kind to me. And then you somehow decided to keep me. That... means so much. And this story would hardly be what it is without you. You gave me Monga when I needed a character. You say it is only looking through Wiki, but I swear it is some magic of yours because I certainly can't seem to do it! You also allowed me to look over a list of yours you were using for plotting, and I appreciate that. You are always there with what I need, somehow. But, more than that, this silly, overlong little doodle of mine is for you because, whether you know it or not, all the time I've spent lurking in your docs has helped me grow as a writer. You've taught me so much about character and detail and plotting just by being yourself. Thank you always, my dear. I adore you.
> 
> All of that said... This story is not my best work. Nor is it the sequel I promised you both. I'm sorry for that. I tried to write the sequel, and I will finish the half-done thing in time. But I found I couldn't write that story just yet. I tried three times and three times had to put it down. There were several reasons for this. The first time it was because there was something missing in the story. It is important to have and END I suppose... And I didn't have one. The other times I put that story down were because I kept running up against questions. I kept looking at Kito and asking, "Why aren't you happy? You're with someone who adores you, someone you love, but you're not happy. Why won't you tell Kakashi you love him? Why? And how do you know Itachi? And what is that scar you never told me about?" There were just too many questions. And when I had the answers... Kito looked at me and said this story here was the one I had to write. I didn't want to because it felt too big for me. I knew I would never do it justice, but he said I would have to try all the same... And when I was done I would have to write two other stories before he would be ready to admit to Kakashi the truth. That he loves his ANBU... So... I am sorry, but this is a prequel set three years before All I Can Do, and Kakashi is out of sight and there is little love or brightness here. But, just because they have yet to meet each other, that doesn't mean Kakashi and Kito's lives aren't connected and don't brush against each other. After all, Kakashi was ANBU code name Hound long before he stumbled through a midical nin's window...
> 
> And these notes are very long... I'm sorry for that and, once more, for the fact this piece could be better. I doubt anyone will read it beyond a very few people. But I don't think I care about that. Here are words; when I inscribed them on paper they felt like heaven and they kept me alive. That, and the two of you, are more than enough. In the end, it is the doing of the thing that matters, and the end result is of little importance. I wrote this for myself, and now I give it to you.

“Kitō”

“Hōshō- _sama_ ,” I said with a smile, turning. Only to blink, as I felt my smile melt away at the serious, somewhat grim set of my fellow _Iryō-nin’s_ face. “Captain Hōshō,” I amended, clutching the bundle of linen I was holding to my chest.

The _Konoha Byōin_ had been quiet all day, the worst injuries to be dealt with scrapped knees and minor cuts and bruises, which was why I found myself restocking one of the hospital’s supply closets for lack of anything better to do. Looking at the set of my captain’s features spiked my heartrate and sent the silly thing pumping against my ribs, though. His expression said what was about to come might not be to my liking.

“Kitō, I need to talk to you a moment.”

“Of course, captain,” I murmured, turning to place the stack of linens I held on the shelf. The fact Hōshō’s usually quiet, smooth features were fixed in the almost pained and regretful cast did not bode well. He seldom looked that way, even at the worst of times, and I wondered what, if anything, I had done.

I thought Hōshō would motion me out of the small space we were in, perhaps request we go to his sparse, rather unitarian office, but he did none of those things. Instead, lowering his voice and saying my name again.

“Kitō.”

“Yes, captain- _sama_ ,” I returned, shifting from foot to foot, my anxiety turning over and squeezing my chest like a vice on my lungs.

“I’ve had a mission request for a skilled _Iryō-nin_ passed to me.”

“M-mission request?” I stuttered over the words because such a simple thing shouldn’t make Hōshō look the way he did. It was common enough for members of the medics corps, the _Iryō Butai_ , to be assigned missions outside of _Konoha_. Having a medical _nin_ as part of a four-man squad increased the odds of the team’s success. It was normal. Easy. Unconcerning. I’d already been on various missions without mishap. Meaning there was something more.

Hōshō confirmed this with his next words. “It’s an ANBU class mission, Kitō.” His dark eyes looked dim and sad saying the words.

“A-ANBU class?” This was an entirely different situation. It was less common for _Iryō-nin_ to be assigned to accompany ANBU, but not unheard of. Yet, those _Iryō-nin_ selected were of a far higher caliber than me. Chosen for specific personality traits and skills required on the mission. Chosen with care, in the hopes they’d _make it through_ the mission to carry out further missions.

I felt myself sway. Felt my face drain of color and then burn. Many of the medic _nin_ who went on those missions never came back. Often times, an ANBU assignment was a death sentence, and if it wasn’t, it never left an _Iryō-nin_ unscathed. It left them scared and different, almost shattered, in a way which set them apart from the rest. So much so, my kind had a name for those who ran with ANBU. _Yōkai-nin_. Ghost- _nin_. Phantoms. What remained.

Despite it all, despite my obvious reaction, my caption only nodded at my words and said nothing of my flaming face or weakness. “I want you to take the mission, Kitō.”

“But why, Hōshō- _sama_?!” The words burst out, unthinkingly. In all honesty, I’d anticipated this was where the conversation was aimed. There was no other reason the matter would have been brought up in my hearing. But it made the actual admittance no less easy to understand or bare. “Surely there must be someone better qualified!” _Some_ Yōkai-nin _! Someone who knows what it is to work with ANBU!_ “I’m- I’m only a surgeon. Just a simple medic…” I’d be no use at all. Just a burden… Sure to get in the way and be a nuisance…

He let me finish, let me taper off, both in word and thought, then sighed and took a step closer to me, so he could put a hand on my shoulder. Squeeze it. “No, you’re not, Kitō. You’re a highly gifted surgeon, and, what’s more, an extremely inventive and innovative specialist in medical research and development. All of which are requirements of the request for a medical _nin_. I could assign this mission to Hakui or Mogusa or Humadori or Mitate, or any number of others under my command, but I’m asking you to take it, Kitō. For a number of reasons, not the least of which, is the fact you are the best qualified.”

My flush vanished to be replaced with nothing but the throb of my heart. I felt it would burst. Not because what was being presented to me was any form of honor or complement, but because it was a weight. Such a weight. He hadn’t said it, but the message was plain. It had been difficult for Hōshō to select any of his _Iryō-nin_ to sacrifice to the ANBU. Choice made, if I did not accept the mission, someone else would still have to. One of my fellow medics serving under Hōshō _would have to_ because he had been given the request for an _Iryō-nin_ , matching the skills of those under his command.

I swallowed at the thought. Whether I felt capable or not, whether I had the courage or not, was I willing to let one of my compatriots take a mission I was hesitant to follow through on? Was I so unwilling to risk myself? My hesitation felt a betrayal. Perhaps as much a betrayal as Hōshō felt in having to choose one of his own for something so unpleasant.

Letting out a small, soft, almost whine at the pain of it, making me feel small and so much younger than my two decades, I let my face sink into the high collar of my medics corps uniform. “I’ll take it Hōshō- _sama_.” My voice was distant. A bare whisper past my lips, as I watched my life shift away from me.

He sighed again, the hand on my shoulder tightening almost painfully. “Then you need to report to Inoichi Yamanaka and Ibiki Morino in the Intelligence Division.”

I blinked at this unexpected turn of affairs, despite how dizzy I felt. “The Intelligence Division? Why there, Hōshō- _sama_?” _Why am I not meeting an ANBU caption?_

My fellow medic let go of me. He shook his head. “I was told to select one of my _Iryō-nin_ and send them to the _Jōhōbu_ , not the specifics of why. I’m sorry, Kitō.”

“No need to be sorry, Captain Hōshō!” I assured, desperately wanting to placate and ease his feelings of guilt, if I could. It was not his fault he was asked to do this, not even his fault he’d chosen me to risk myself. He’d had no choice. We all followed duty, in the end. Even if we protested it. “I’ll… be going then.”

It was easy to exit the supply closet and step back into the main flow of the Tree Leaf Hospital. A relief even. It was less easy to return the greetings of my fellow medics without my forced smile cracking or my face giving me away. Impossible really. They all frowned at me, as I passed, and I was only glad Hakui was not around. She would never have let me leave unquestioned.

_Hakui._

We were not more than friends despite the fact we had recently begun bedding each other. But there was honest affection between us, and I felt my heart tear a little, as I stepped out of the hospital and realized I might not get a chance to say goodbye to her. I might be heading with slow, weary footfalls toward the inner part of _Konoha_ , and not out its gates just yet, but this did not mean I would be coming back. Something in me wished I could have at least hugged Hakui and told her thank you for being kind to me.

I did not notice I was crying, until I bit my lip and tasted liquid salt there. Then I was wiping tears off my cheeks with my palms and taking giant, shuddering breaths in an effort to stop my foolishness. I was _Iryō-nin_. _Shinobi._ I might not be able to fight like many _nin_ , but I could die for _Konoha_ , if I was asked to. I’d made up my mind to it when I’d turned my back on my small, home village on the borders of the Land of Fire and followed a group of _shinobi_ , I hardly knew, to the Village Hidden by Leaves.

 _You’re_ Iryō-nin _and will die by the third clause! Hold yourself together, Kitō!_

Clenching my teeth, I channeled _chakra_ into the _Tenketsu_ in my legs and leaped up to a rooftop. It was harder to think or be afraid while I was running alone ridgepoles and jumping between buildings. My eyes were damp and my lashes sticky when I dropped to earth again beside the sign reading _Konohagakure Jōhōbu_ , but I had myself under better control.

What did it matter if my skin felt drawn and tight, or my heart squeezed out pain with every beat? At least my hands did not shake, and my voice was steady when I went in and told the hard-eyed desk _shinobi_ I was there to report to Inoichi and Ibiki.

He scrutinized me, making me feel all the more small and useless, before taking my name and credentials and telling me to wait. I was sitting with my elbows braced on my thighs, hands hanging between my knees, and my fingers locked together, when one of my reasons for being there came to find me. I didn’t know he was there at first, not the way I was bent over my legs, my eyes distant and focused on my interwoven fingers, as if they could explain it all to me. But the soft tread of his feet and the subtle clearing of his throat alerted me to his presence.

Blinking, I looked up at him, only to take in intent, but not unkind features, long, blond hair caught up in a high ponytail, and flat, green eyes. The man was attractive and intimidating all at once. “You must be Kitō. I’m Inoichi Yamanaka, head of the Analysis Team.” He extended a hand to me. “It’s good to meet you.”

“Oh! Ah! Ah! Good to meet you as well, Yamanaka- _sama_ ,” I sputtered, standing and awkwardly grasping his hand.

He watched me stumble over my greeting, observed my face coloring, and returned, “You can call me Inoichi, Kitō.”

“Yes, Inoichi- _sama_ ,” I managed, sinking into my collar.

Whatever he thought of me, this medical _nin_ sent to him for an ANBU class mission, he didn’t articulate it. Just took me in a moment more, then indicated I should follow him.

“We’ll talk when we get to where Ibiki is waiting,” was all he said, escorting me through a door and down a bare, mono-color hall. Then down several floors, into rooms made of stone.

The whole of the area of the Intelligence Division I was led through appeared to be underground. There were no windows and the doors were thick and heavy. The air was the same. My breaths seemed to rasp in the stifling atmosphere and my lungs felt congested. Almost full of fluid.

Perhaps this was only my nervousness, though. The further into the warren I proceeded with Inoichi, the more I felt myself coming apart. Whatever hold I had gained on myself during my sprint to the Intelligence Division seemed to be leaving me a little more with every step I took. Silently, reflectively, and unintentionally, I prayed to all the _kami_ I would have enough steadiness to sustain me through the briefing I knew was coming.

After what felt like an age, Inoichi opened a door and motioned me to precede him in. Another man, dressed in dark blue and a long, black coat, his face marred by a duo of twisted and jagged scars, sat at a table inside. He rose when I entered, followed by Inoichi, and introduced himself as Ibiki.

Shifting on my feet, which felt a million kilometers beneath me, I acknowledged the greeting with one only a little less stuttering than the one I’d offered the Head of the Analysis Team. Still, neither of the men appeared inclined to comment on this. Inoichi just indicated a chair. “Please have a seat, Kitō.”

I did as asked, and Ibiki settled opposite me. Much to my disconcertion, Inoichi stayed on his feet. At least, he wasted no time in explaining why it was they’d requested a medical _nin_. Opening a case resting on the table near where Ibiki sat, the blond man extracted a slim thing, and rounded the table to set it before me. A file he quickly flipped open with a flick of his nimble fingers.

“Two days ago, we captured an _Iwa_ ANBU by the name of Monga. This man holds a piece of information _Konoha_ wants, in no uncertain terms. Unfortunately, my attempts to extract the knowledge directly from his mind have proven useless. Monga had exceptional mental barriers, leaving us to conclude, other, less pleasant means of acquiring the information are in order.”

My mouth opened then shut. My eyes darted from Inoichi’s fine features to Ibiki’s scarred ones, to the little picture of an _Iwagakure shinobi_ clipped to the data in the open file before me. Though I was sitting, I had the sensation of vertigo, as though I was going to tip off my chair at any moment and sprawl on the floor. This was not what I had expected. This was worse.

Not my life on the line.

Someone else’s life.

“You’re talking about torture.” It surprised me how calm my voice was. Serene. Almost deadpan. I felt rather weightless. “You… want me to heal Monga after you torture him, so he will be capable of taking more pain.” I could have said _the prisoner_ or _the man_ or _the_ Iwa _ANBU_ or anything else, but I couldn’t force those distancing words past my lips. The person we were discussing had a name. A life. A home. A face that was staring at me from his picture.

I put a hand over that accusing figure and turned my eyes up to Inoichi. “Don’t you? That’s exactly what you want me to do, isn’t it?” It made far too much sense. This was why they had requested a surgeon who also specialized in medical research and development. In essence, a medic who could perform inventive surgeries in a field-like setting. “Please be honest, Inoichi- _sama_.”

Those flat, green eyes took me in and didn’t waver. He didn’t deny it, either. “Yes. That is what we want you to do, Kitō.”

“I am the Head of the Torture Division, if you recall.” This from Ibiki. Prompting my focus on him. He was watching me with quiet, unbroken concentration. “Sometimes unpleasant action needs to be taken.”

“What we are doing isn’t without good reason, Kitō.” Inoichi moved back around the table to take several other things from the case. He brought them and set them before me, one at a time, as he spoke. “ANBU code name Hound, ANBU code name Lynx, ANBU code name Viper, ANBU code name Crane. The entire team was captured by _Iwa_ operatives and Monga knows where they’re being held. They’ve been prisoners of enemy _shinobi_ for four days now. Do you honestly think they’re being treated better than what we intend for Monga?”

Almost against my will, my fingers went to trace the pictures in the files laid out before me. Men whose faces were still covered by porcelain masks, even in classified information packets. Men? Maybe. Perhaps men and women. How was I to know? All I knew was here were more lives my actions would affect.

Aid in the torture of one man to save four. Or let four die to save one. There was no right way. No way out of the trap. Whatever I did, someone would suffer for it.

“We need your help to get these ANBU back, Kitō.” The words were low and affirming all I knew.

I tried raising my eyes to Inoichi, but they were swimming with burning tears and his image blurred. “I… I-”

He sighed. “I understand this goes against your instincts as a medic, but this is going to happen, one way or another, Kitō. If you can’t assist us, we’ll request a different _Iryō-nin_.”

 _A different_ Iryō-nin _._

Images of Hakui or Mitate or Migaki sitting where I was, caught between two sharp-edge options, with nowhere to turn that would not result in blood on their hands, rose up in my mind. To choke me, to abuse me. But it was the thought of Hakui that troubled me the most. The visceral idea of that slender body, I’d recently had under my hands, spotted with blood, while I cowered away from something unpleasant, tormented me.

Head spinning, gut twisting and boiling, I swayed in my seat, dizzy and sure I _would_ fall, despite being seated. But, also, sure I would be sick. With a strangled sound, I brought the hand, which had been resting over the face of ANBU code name Hound, up to press over my mouth and repress my heaves. The fingers of my other hand gripped the edge of the table so tightly they turned white and trembled.

I found myself gasping for breath through my fingers and bent over the table with weeping eyes millimeters above the pictures of the captured ANBU. I wanted to faint. Wished for it with everything in me, every part of my being. But I knew I would not be allowed it.

That mercy would not be for me, just as every other had been denied me my whole life.

Above me, Inoichi sighed. “We’ll request a different medic, then. You can go-”

“I’ll do it.”

The words were low and strangled, but they stopped the Yamanaka. “What?”

“I’ll do it, Inoichi- _sama_. It is my duty to _Konoha_ to look after its _shinobi_.” This came out small and as pale as I felt, but it settled the room.

“Alright, Kitō.”

Inoichi’s footsteps retreated from me and I was able to sit upright again. Eyes lingering on the files before me. Faceless _nin_ of _Konoha_. It _was_ my duty to help them, whether or not I knew their names or faces. If I had to hurt myself in the process, I could. I often spilled my own blood.

My hands scrubbed over my thighs, unconsciously chaffing the scars hidden by the pants of my medics corps uniform. The desire to open my flesh was a strong one, pulsing up through me and leaving me empty inside.

Yet, Inoichi’s voice recalled me, as he approached me, once more, and set other items on the table over the ANBUs’ files. A red and white, porcelain mask and a different file. “If you’re sure, then, for the duration of this assignment, you will be assuming the ANBU code name and persona Owl. You will be granted ANBU level clearance and credentials. You may be just the medic offering assistance in this case, but we have no intention of letting your face or identity become compromised, Kitō. For all intents and purposes, you are now ANBU, under the direct order of Lord Danzō Shimura.”

My mind lost track of the flow of his words part way through. I couldn’t help it. My fingers crept up to touch the mask resting beside the file with my name and past history laid out in it in neat characters. Went to trace over the smooth contours of porcelain, which were to become my face.

It was blank. Ineffable. An absence of features more than the representation of the bird it was meant to depict. Something to strike fear, as much as to hide the face beneath. This was always the way with masks. I knew it from my childhood and the knowing chilled me. And this was how I was to approach Monga. The man who would be in pain. Behind a mask. At a distance. Unable to offer any comfort. Only another form of pain.

Not knowing the thoughts running through my mind, Inoichi went on. “We’ve prepared a room for you in the facility. The rest of your gear is there, along with all the medical supplies you will need. I’d advise you to take advantage of the time to rest and prepare. We’ll require your expertise this afternoon.”

“Ahhh!” The little, surprised articulation escaped me, and I wrenched my fingers from the mask, as if it had burned me. “T-this afternoon, Inoichi- _sama_! So soon?!”

“Our ANBU have already been held for four days, or have you forgotten?”

I swallowed and turned my eyes on Ibiki. He’d barely moved from his position. “No, Ibiki- _sama_ ,” I murmured. “I haven’t forgotten.”

“Don’t you think we should act as soon as possible to get them back?”

“Yes, Ibiki- _sama_.”

But this didn’t keep me from crying. Openly and unabashedly. I was simply weeping into my arm with the thing wrapped around my face. My sobs heavy in the stifling room A space all too much like an integration cell.

The two members of the _Konoha_ Torture and Interrogation Force didn’t try to stop me. Doubtless they’d seen many men cry, until they were exhausted, and just let me alone, until I was weak and spent.

Only then did Inoichi place a hand on my shoulder and say gently, “Come on, Kitō.”

He showed me out, placed me in the hands of a lower ranking _shinobi_ with the orders to see to it I was shown my room and fed, and told me I would be called when needed. I acknowledged it all and disassociated the moment I was free of any other probing eyes. When the door of my room closed behind me, I simply fell against it, slid down to the floor, and sat there, until my need pulled me elsewhere.

Cutting had never felt so good, but I only allowed myself a slight relief, knowing I would need all my strength and _chakra_ for other things. The food I was brought helped in boosting my energy reserves, or, at least, my physical ones. Nothing could have eased my mental stresses, except the cutting, and that I knew would have to wait. I would simply have to bear it all, until my assignment was done.

I attempted to assure myself I _could_ do what was asked of me. I could heal the wounds presented to me, as if they were any other injuries given to me at the _Konoha Byōin_ but, holding the ANBU gear laid out for me in my hands, slipping off my medics corps uniform, to pull on the ANBU attire, I knew there affirmations were nothing more than pleasant lies. Standing before my room’s mirror in those strange clothes, stiff with metal armor, I felt I’d shifted out of my skin into another, frightening one, and I dreaded having to put on the owl mask, which would cover my face and alter my identity altogether. Turning me into something ghastly.

An apparition.

A phantom.

A _Yōkai-nin_.

These things were not what a healer was meant to be.

I was still grappling with this, chewing my bottom lip before that mirror, when a knock sounded on my door, summoning me back to the lower regions of the Intelligence Division. The same _shinobi_ who had brought me to my temporary living quarters brought me back to the room where I had met Inoichi and Ibiki and left me there. After that, there was nothing for me to do for several minutes, apart from fiddle with the small bundle of medical supplies I’d brought with me and the offending ANBU mask.

This latter, I’d refused to put on. Saving the inevitable for the last moment. Part of me wondered how hard I would have to throw the thing in order to break it. Surely ANBU wouldn’t wear the things if they were innately fragile.

I was frowning at the thought, and the item in question, when Inoichi came in. He said my name and I squeaked at the sound of his voice, turning, bumping into the table, clumsily, and pressing a hand to my chest, over my heart, because he’d startled me. “Inoichi- _sama_!” I stuttered out.

The man looked worn and he was messaging at one set of fingers with the other, but beyond that there was no change in his appearance from the time I’d seen him. “Are you ready, Kitō?” he asked in continued disregard of my awkwardness and stammering.

“Y-yes,” I managed. Then, “N-no,” as one of my hands slipped back over the table and encountered the mask, making it scrap on the wood. “I- I just need to put on the mask, Inoichi- _sama_.”

“Do that,” he commanded, leaving me to flush and nod.

It was difficult to set the porcelain over my face and adjust the strap behind my head. Not because the mask was uncomfortable, it rode well on my skull, but for the sheer mental weight of it. I felt unreal looking out of the holes drilled through the smooth material and my own breaths were hot on my face, puffing back over my skin with every exhale. As if something were in the mask with me, something unseen and sinister.

_You’re just breathing too fast, Kitō! Hyperventilating, in fact! You need to get a hold on yourself!_

The rushing thoughts made my head pound, either that or I truly was short on oxygen. Whatever the case, mask secure, I was able to blink at Inoichi’s wavering form and say with some certainty, “I’m ready now, Inoichi- _sama_.”

He didn’t question me on that. Only indicated I should take my medical supplies and follow him. Bundle under my arm, I trotted beside the other man. His strides were longer than mine, and with my difficulty controlling my breathing, it was hard to set a pace and keep up with him.

Strangely though, the walk was short. Down one hall and around a sharp turn, and we stopped before a metal door, guarded by two men in ANBU masks.

“Monga is being held here, “Inoichi said, motioning to the door. “Ape and Cobra will see to your protection, while you administer treatment.”

“Of course, Inoichi- _sama_ ,” I murmured. Unconsciously, I shuffled from foot to foot. If I’d had the high collar of my medics corps uniform, or my own, everyday scarf, I would gladly let my face sink into the material, despite the mask I wore. “You… are not going to accompany me?”

He shook his head. “I have other matters to attend to.”

“Of course,” I repeated. Then I could only stand, while the blond man walked away from me. It was odd how alone I suddenly felt. Left with two, faceless men and an _Iwa shinobi_ I had never met.

“Owl- _san_ ,” one of the guards, the one with an ape’s face, said after a moment. “Will you go in?”

“Owl…” The word trailed away. _I_ was Owl. And I had a duty to perform, even if it left me with the feeling I was being stalked with every breath which washed over my face. “Yes.” Clutching the bundle under my arm tighter, I took a step closer to the door. “Yes, I’ll go in.”

Ape opened the door and Cobra entered fist. I followed behind with Ape close at my heel. Yet, once inside, both men fell away. One closing the door behind us before they both took up positions to either side of the exit.

Leaving me standing before Monga.

The room was dimmer than the halls. And more barren then the one where I had met Inoichi and Ibiki, even if it was similar in shape and design. A stone square with lighting only in the corners. A single chair sat in the center of the floor and Monga was tied to it, his hands behind him and his legs strapped to those of the chair.

The space smelled of blood.

Smelled of heat and sweat and injury. The atmosphere was thick with it, but instead of deepening my unease, the fact had the opposite effect.

Someone was hurt and I was a healer. Unthinkingly, my feet carried me toward that man slumped in the chair, his head hanging on his chest. My _Iryō-nin_ instincts would have had me appraising my patient’s condition quickly, but Monga wasn’t so dazed as he appeared.

He grunted a tired sound in his throat and raised his head at my approach. “And who might you be? I don’t recall seeing your mask before. You here to give me some more?”

I stopped at the nasal, whistling words, my steps faltering. Considering this moment, I hadn’t known what to expect but Monga wasn’t entirely it. He was a very large man, tall and muscular. His brown hair was tussled and matted with tacky blood. One, small, black eye peered at me, the other was swollen closed and dripping blood, but though his cheeks were bruised, it was still possible to make out the gray-blue, fang-shaped markings painted or tattooed beneath the center of his eyes. The rest of his face was dominated by a wide nose that had the look of being broken.

Even if Monga hadn’t been obviously beaten, he wouldn’t have been a handsome man. Rather one of the rough looking ones I generally tried to avoid. A brawler. An _Iwa jounin_. An ANBU.

Monga chuckled a wet sound and shook his head. “Just going to stand there, or are you going to get on with it?” He accompanied the question with a movement of his head that showed his neck. Secured around it was a wide, leather collar inlayed with a _chakra_ seal in bright metal.

“Do you wish us to restrain him, Owl- _san_?” Ape asked. Tone flat. Emotionless. Sickening. How could anyone speak as if they were not even human like that? Was the man behind the mask really so unaffected by another’s pain?

“No, Ape- _san_ ,” I said, taking a step forward and kneeling to set down my bundle and unroll it. “Monga-” I paused, tripping on what I wanted to say next. The implications of it had me raising my head and starring off at nothing. “Monga- _sama_ is already restrained enough. I do not require your help.”

Ape said nothing, but the man I spoke of seemed surprised by both my voice and my use of the honorific, spoken in perfect truth and not mockery. His tattered face crinkled in a frown and he studied my slight form. “Just who are you?”

Ahh!” The sound was a gasp, as I broke out of my far-off thoughts. “My name is…” My throat constricted, realizing just how close I’d come to saying, _Kitō, my name is Kitō_. With a little whining noise, I let my face sink toward my chest, my fingers splayed around the gauze and bandages, medications and delicate instruments I’d spread on the floor. “Owl. My name is Owl. I am an _Iryō-nin_ , Monga- _sama_.”

“A medic,” he grunted. “Probably never even worn that mask before, I bet. So, you’re the bitch they sent to fix me up between sessions.”

I winced at the insult and the truth of it, finding I couldn’t raise my eyes from my medical supplies to look at him.

“You should hold your tongue,” Ape said, taking a step forward. Hand slipping toward the weapons on his belt, and for what reason?

“I did not ask for your help, Ape- _san_.” Murmured words that still locked the ANBU mid-step. Telling me the power I had there, in that room. At least, for the moments when I was there to heal. “Go back to the door, Ape- _san_.”

Patience’s was something _Iryō-nin_ learned well and early in life. I watched the man struggle with himself, struggle with the way he was taking orders from a little piece of nothing, just as I wrestled with _giving_ those orders to one so much higher in rank and importance than me. And I waited until he turned on his heel, almost spun, and retreated to his previous place. Only then did I let myself look back at my reason for being there.

“Yes, Monga- _sama_ ,” I affirmed. “That is what I am.”

A weighted pause between us, while his wrecked face did strange things. As if he were trying to hate me and ending despising himself when he couldn’t. This could have been my own heightened emotions, though, and I gave it no thought. “I will examine you now, Monga- _sama_ ,” I said, unfolding from the ground.

He made a deep, grunting growl. “Do what you want. Not like I can stop you.”

This made me stop, teeth catching my lip behind the ANBU mask I wore. I had never encountered a patient who _did not_ want me to help them before. It struck me as a violation suddenly, all the more because this man had already been violated, in a way. The vision of Inoichi standing before me, tired and messaging worn knuckles rose to smother my sight, and I swayed. I had a duty to perform, yet…

I stood there and looked down at my hands. One way or another, I had to hear him say the answer to the question in my mind. “Do you not want me to heal you, Monga- _sama_?”

“What is this?” he snapped. “You just going to renege on your duty and go away if I say I don’t want you to touch me? Go fuck yourself.”

Wincing again at the verbal assault, I involuntarily took a step back. “Monga- _sama_ , I-”

But he wouldn’t let me finish or reach that point where I would work out in my own mind what I intended. “Just get on with it, kid, I haven’t got all day.”

Face burning bright red behind the porcelain, I went to him. Even sitting, as he was, Monga’s height almost matched my own, putting his head in easy alignment with my hands. “I am going to probe your injuries, Monga- _sama_ ,” I said, raising my hands to either side of his bruised and battered face. “It will be somewhat uncomfortable.”

“Like everything else isn’t,” he muttered, but this rolled over me.

Finally, able to perform medical treatment, I became lost in my practiced motions, only speaking the same reassuring litany I would to any patent under my care. The angry flush falling off my cheeks, my hands glowed green with _chakra_ and I glided them slowly around his head. Starting at the face, I noted his wounds, fractured cheekbones, cracked teeth, broken nose, and moved upward, over the forehead and the cranium. Detached retina, skull fractures, minor pressure on the brain, concussion… I ticked off each wrong to be righted, as I registered it with my manual _chakra_ search. Then I switched the positions of my hands to either side of his head, the color of the _chakra_ swirling and changing slightly. Darkening.

“I am going to examine your brain, Monga- _sama_. Be prepared for a sensation of pressure inside your skull.”

Monga began huffing garbled words in annoyance at my continued explanation of everything I was doing, but then jerked in the chair and strained against the bonds holding him, cursing loudly. I _had_ warned him, but his actions and ripe profanity didn’t bother me. This was a normal reaction when I initiated my scan of a person’s _dorsal posterior insula_. It was a weird and disconcerting feeling to have invading _chakra_ pressing into the brain.

Still, I did little but murmur assertions it was alright and follow through on my scan. The _dorsal posterior insula_ and _parietal lobe_ were together, for me, indicators of injuries I couldn’t see so clearly. Pain signals were first received by the _thalamus_ , then were processed by the _cerebral cortex_ before being divided between the _dorsal posterior insula_ and _parietal lobe_ , depending on the pain’s severity, where it was located in the body, and what type of pain it was. If you could track and correlate the part of the _dorsal posterior insula_ or _parietal lobe_ lit up with pain to the rest of the body…

I hummed unconsciously in my search. This was my purpose in life. I had spent years mapping these parts of the mind, and I only needed a few moments to confirm what I had already ascertained.

Then it was only a matter of discontinuing my search, changing my _chakra_ just slightly, yet again, and beginning to heal the list of injuries. I told Monga what I would do before each operation and he settled into that before I was done. The detached retina I saved for last, as it required more delicate concentration to reconstruct the eye.

Finished at last, Monga sighed, blinking his eyes. “Well, nice to see out of both again,” he muttered.

“Yes, Monga- _sama_ ,” I assented. My hands ached, but I flexed them and brought them back to either side of his head a last time. “I’m going to take one last look at your brain, Monga- _sama_. I noted something before…”

I trialed off, my concentration going into the _dorsal posterior insula_ and the _parietal lobe_. The lit-up areas from my first search had dimmed or gone out, indicating my ministrations were successful. But… That one place I’d half passed over still glowed dully. “You are experiencing pain in your left shoulder, Monga- _sama_.”

“Huh? What’s that?” he grunted, moving his head to look up at me.

One of my hands slid down to hover over his left shoulder, the place where the collarbone met muscle. “You have discomfort here.”

“Yeah.” This was a rumble. “It’s an old injury, nothing you need to concern yourself with, kid.”

My other hand went to join the first, the green glow surrounding my hands was agitated. “There appears to be some shrapnel lodged in the bone, Monga- _sama_. It must twinge every time you move.”

“So?” The single word was harsh. “Your friends didn’t put it there, so it’s none of your business. Besides, my medics said they couldn’t get the thing out.”

“I can get it out, Monga- _sama_ ,” I murmured with assurance.

“I’m not really in the mood for surgery, kid.”

Still, despite this rebuttal, Monga watched me with intent fascination, his healed face drawn in concentration, as I knelt down and inhaled slowly. Watched as I pulled _chakra_ out of other portions of my body and channeled it into my hands, until they flickered and undulated with dark, evergreen-colored _chakra_. Watched when I stood, wavering slightly with weariness, and held both hands over the site of his old wound.

With another thoughtless hum of concentration, I fed my life energy into the pain-inflamed area. Light, little runnels of _chakra_ that pooled around the piece of metal embedded in flesh and bone, until it was surrounded.

When the procedure reached its climax, Monga let lose a deep grunt of surprise and slumped into me, breathing shocked little inhales. But I didn’t stop. I closed my fist over the thing there and continued infusing the surgical site with _chakra_ with my other hand.

It was easier to induce the muscle and flesh to heal and join over the place where the metal had been, then it was to remove the object causing the problem. A few minutes and it was done. Monga sat upright, twisting his head to squint at his shoulder, even while he rolled the shoulder as much as his bonds allowed. Testing the motion.

“How in bloody, _kami_ damned fuck-”

He stopped when I tripped back a step and fell to one knee, panting and sweating, my whole body trembling. So close to _chakra_ exhaustion.

“What’d you just do, kid?” Monga queried, voice trite and dry. The unspoken question, _And why’d you do it?_ left hanging between us.

“My- My own technique!” I gasped. Part of me wanted to topple over and lie still, but I would not allow it. Struggling, I gained my feet again and even managed to catch my breath. Then I held out my hand to Monga, to show him what rested on my palm. A triangular piece of gray metal chipped about the tip. The thing looked like the point of a _kunai_. I could only imagine the wound it had caused, so close to his heart. “I call it the Flicker Retrieval Technique. A form of reverse _Shunshin_.”

“You pulled the damn thing out of me and closed up the cavity behind it, all in one move. The hell are you?”

“N-no one, Monga- _sama_ ,” I stammered, closing my hand over the fragment of _kunai_. “O-only Owl. Just… just an _Iryō-nin_.”

“You’re pretty polite for a _Konoha_ bitch,” he rumbled.

I flinched and the two men at the door shifted on their feet, but neither moved, to their credit, waiting on a request I didn’t make. All I did in response to this further insult was set the bit of metal in my hand with my collection of medical supplies and ask softly, “How do you feel, Monga- _sama_?”

“I ache, kid,” he snapped. “How do you expect me to feel after your friends beat me to shit?”

Nodding, my fingers ran over the various items at my disposal and picked up a container. “I can give you something for the pain, Monga- _sama_.”

He went stiff, his jaw clenching. “Why would you do that?” This was ground out passed locked teeth. “I get why you’re here and get why you patched up my face and thick skull, but what I don’t get is why you yanked that bit of _kunai_ out of me or why you’d care if I hurt. I’m your fucking enemy.”

I stood still, unsure. Because here again was that attempt to hate. But… Hate what? Me? He was staring disgust into my face, only…

My fingers went to touch the mask covering my features, to crawl over the porcelain’s slippery-smooth surface with as much disgust as Monga was regarding it with. This ridiculous and hard, yet, fragile barrier between us. If I were allowed, I would have ripped the hideous thing off and thrown it, to crash on the wall. When I spoke my voice shock with my own vehement repulsion at the sickness of it all.

“I… am _Iryō-nin_ , Monga- _sama_ ; I have no enemy but suffering. There is no need for you to be in pain if you are not under interrogation, Monga- _sama_.”

Something in the man seemed to break at the words. The crack making him grimace and turn away, deflating into himself, his attempt to hate again thwarted. “Sure, kid,” he muttered. “Whatever you say.”

I let my hand fall away from the ANBU mask I wore. Making a low, pained sound in my throat, I glanced down at the medication in my hands. “Would you like something for the pain, Monga- _sama_?”

He grunted, shaking his head, wearily. “Sure, kid,” he repeated, without bothering to look at me.

With slow, deliberate care, I extracted a single pill from the container and brought it to Monga. He swallowed it dry and I retreated, to kneel and begin rolling up my bundle of supplies. “Is there anything else I can do for you, Monga- _sama_?” I asked, voice wavering, as my vision blurred. I found myself frowning at my hands, trembling there above the bundle, wondering why they were doubling.

An annoyed curse was my answer. “I think you’ve done enough, kid. Get lost.”

“Yes, Monga- _sama_.” I said the words, then spread a hand flat on the ground to steady myself with a desperate gasp. “A-ape- _san_ ,” I stammered. “I- I can’t get up.”

Before the man by the door could react or Monga could say something whipish, I toppled over, my owl mask clicking on the stone, while my hands spasmed, clawing needlessly at the floor. Laying there with my senses dimming, I had just time to think, perhaps, using the Flicker Retrieval Technique hadn’t been the best idea before I floundered down into unconsciousness. Though simple enough in its operation, the surgical technique used an enormous amount of _chakra_. In essence, I’d drained myself in one move over a non-life-threatening matter.

But then, I’d never been accused of being the smartest person.

Afterward, there was the vulgar notion of Ape and Cobra murmuring above me in heated, dissatisfied voices, and being carried like a lightly protesting sack of _chakra_ exhausted medical _nin_ out of the room, to be deposited in my bed, where I repeatedly insinuated along the way I wanted to be.

“Just tired. Want sleep. Is fine.”

And so on and on, until I was sure the two men were happy to be rid of me. Still, despite these half-dreamed impressions, I didn’t fully wake until hours later, when a heavy hammering came at my door.

This, at last, brought me to cotton-stuffed waking. I _was_ in my bed in my room at the Intelligence Division. I’d basically been dumped there, still dressed in my ANBU gear, and had somehow wormed my way under the blankets I was now clutching in my lap. I sat stupidly blinking my dry eyes and turning my tussled head to take in this strangeness, even while another round of rough knocks resounded because my mushed, padded mind wasn’t embracing the fact someone wanted me to answer.

It wasn’t until the door was forced open that I squeaked, fisting the blankets up to my chest, and gasped, “I-inoichi- _sama_!”

The blond man took in my state with the same flat, green eyes he’d studied me with the day, we’d met. _Yesterday_ , I wondered, as the man spoke, “Sorry to wake you, Kitō. We need your expertise again.”

“But it’s the middle of the night, Inoichi- _sama_ ,” I said in confusion. I was used to _chakra_ exhaustion and knew its after affects and how my body responded to the state. Even with no other way to tell time, my internal mechanisms told me I’d only been asleep a few hours.

“We don’t have the luxury of time in this matter, Kitō.”

A sickness crept up on me, turning my stomach over and making my head reel, as I realized they were not going to give Monga rest, not even in the night. Sleep deprivation, after all, was another form of torture, and what was more unnerving than never knowing when your tormentors would choose to appear

That this method, in turn, would give me no rest, never even occurred to me. Heart throbbing painful beats, I threw off my covers and swung my feet out of the bed. “Of course, Inoichi- _sama_.” I stood, swayed, caught myself. “I’ll be ready in a moment.”

That probing, green gaze examined me, tracing every line. “You can find your way? Ape and Cobra will be waiting for you.”

“I can find my way, Inoichi- _sama_.” This was true and I didn’t bother asking the man before me if he wanted to be there. I was sure he did not. I only wondered if it was because he was tired or because he did not wish to see his own handiwork anymore.

Inoichi nodded and turned away. When he was gone, I scrambled to right myself and find my medical kit. It took me only minutes to make my way to Monga’s room, muddled, addled mind or no. My blood kept pounding in my ears and rushing through my veins in cold sheets. One refrain skittering in my mind.

_What had they done to him?!_

Ape and Cobra stood to either side of the door, as if they hadn’t moved from the last time I’d been there. Two impenetrable statues with blank, white and red faces.

I stopped, panting, before them, half doubled over, and they exchanged a look. “Are you alright, Owl- _san_?” Ape asked.

“Yes, yes,” I managed. “Inoichi- _sama_ said I should come.”

Ape nodded and moved to open the door for me. I went in first, followed by the other two, and regretted it.

Once more, the room was dim, so that I had to blink several times before my eyes adjusted enough to see. Then I let out a sound of surprise and horror, like a gasp wanting to be a shriek. “Ah! Ahhh! M-monga- _sama_!”

The chair from my last visit was gone. Monga was no longer sitting. He was suspended against the wall by manacles around his wrists attached to chains through iron loops in the ceiling. This alone was not enough to make my eyes sting and burn with bitter tears. No. It was his back. Monga’s shirt had been discarded to bare his back for whips. The skin was hardly recognizable _as_ skin any longer. It was a tattered mass of blood and gore over muscle and bone. Blood ran everywhere to wet and stain his pants and drip in revolting plinks unto the floor.

And the scent. The scent of coppery life stung my nose in a wretched assault. With another cry, I flew across the floor, dropping my medical supplies in an effort to grab at the chains and try to get them loose.

“Ape- _san_! Cobra- _san_!” I gasped. “Get Monga- _sama_ down!”

“That would be unwise, Owl- _san_.”

Ape’s voice was far too calm, and I whirled on him. “I was brought here to fulfill a service to _Konoha_! Get this man down, so I can heal him! He cannot stay like this, the wounds will only open again!”

The two ANBU hesitated, but then moved to carry out my frantic order. Cobra unlocked the chains from the ceiling and Ape helped me lower Monga’s large body to the ground. Somehow, the _Iwa-nin_ was still conscience, breathing heavy and eyeing me faintly.

When Monga was stretched out on his stomach, Ape reached for the chains at his wrists. “We will restrain him in this position, Owl- _san_.”

“No, Ape- _san_ , that will not be necessary.” One of my hands rested on Monga’s upper arm and I crouched over him like some great cat over his cub. “Monga- _sama_ is restrained enough as he is.”

The man in the simian mask regarded me with a distaste I could feel, his dark eyes intense behind the porcelain. “He could hurt you, Owl- _san_.”

I did not move or break eye contact, though my heart was beating wildly. More afraid of my own fellow _Konoha shinobi_ than the man from _Iwa_ below me. “Are you going to hurt me, Monga- _sama_?” I asked.

“Naw, kid,” he responded, voice dry, a rasp. “I haven’t got the energy.”

Ape stared into me. “He could be lying.”

“Then you will have to find yourself another _Iryō-nin_! I am not worth much; I could be easily replaced.”

There was a moment of dead silence, broken only by the rattle of Monga’s breathing, then Ape stood and moved to stand by the door, motioning the ever-silent Cobra to follow.

Left alone to my work, I hitched a sob and wrapped an arm around my face to muffle a scream, which only rang out clear from behind the porcelain. Only after giving vent to this rebellion against the hideousness of it all, was I able to gather control of myself.

I did not bother to examine or pause to explain in slow, systematic terms what I was doing. I only applied healing _chakra_ on the wounds, sealing them shut in unlovely, but efficient, lines, one after another. My energy reserves ran out long before I was able to close them all, and I turned in frustration from clean _chakra_ to slow stitches.

It didn’t occur to me what kind of distressed sounds I was making, didn’t dawn on me my fingers were numb, didn’t register a thick, hot, liquid clot was growing in my nose, to break and trickle down my lips. Did not even brush my consciousness Ape and Cobra were reacting to my plain, fanatic actions, conferring in low tones I didn’t hear, before Cobra went out. All of it passed me by, while I sewed one gash after another closed, and dragged trickles of deep _chakra_ out of my bones, to ease the whip weals toward healing. Nothing broke this fevered work, until the door opened again and admitted Cobra, leading Inoichi.

“Owl.” Inoichi’s calm voice carried across the still room and I turned, hands bloodied from my work, one clenched between my knees, the other resting lightly in Monga’s shoulder.

“I am not done, Inoichi- _sama_!” My own voice was high and wavering, but not to be contended with. It seemed to take the blond Head of the Analysis Team by surprise. He took one step forward and stopped.

“You’ve done enough, Owl.”

I ground my teeth together against the spike of pain in my head and the bitter horror of it on my heart. “I do not tell you how to perform your duty, Inoichi- _sama_! Do not tell me how to do mine!”

“Owl.” Another step toward me, as if I were some injured beast crouched there. “It doesn’t have to be perfect.”

A tremble worked its way through the rest of my body. _It did not need to be perfect._ No. Because they would only tear him apart again. I only need patch and suture him together for the next round. “You are welcome to find yourself another _Iryō-nin_ , Inoichi- _sama_! Until then, I am what you have!”

Everything held still for a stifled moment, then Inoichi nodded. “Alright, Owl.” He turned on his heel and left, as he’d come. In near silence.

Panting and tear-blind, I ignored the men left behind by the door, and turned to bend back over my work. Monga watched me with one eye, his check pressed to the stone floor. “Kind of protective there, huh, kid?”

“Never come between an _Iryō-nin_ and his patient, Monga- _sama_ ,” I returned, blinking fruitlessly to clear my vision. Medical _nin_ might not have been able to fight, but I had heard enough mission stories to know an _Iryō-nin_ crouched with ruthless possessiveness over the bodies of his teammates, the way some small, but fierce, sharp-toothed, woodland creature stood over the body of its mate. Knowing it would fall to the jaws of the bigger animal, but willing to bite until its life was snuffed out. A medic was always the last of his team to fall. It was duty.

My hands stuttered in their work, and I bent further over my knees, willing my eyes to clear. Thin tickles afflicted my lower face and I tasted metal on my tongue.

Monga noted something in the cast of my body. He moved his face a bit to put me into better focus. “You alright, kid?”

“Yes, Monga- _sama_ ,” I assured.

“No, you’re not, kid. You’re bleeding.”

Dizzy, but curious what he meant, I looked to see little spots dripping to splatter on the stone by Monga’s face. Spots coming from under my mask. I lifted a hand and watched the drops hit my palm to mingle with the blood already there. Mine and Monga’s blood coming together.

“ _Chakra_ exhaustion, stage two,” I said listlessly. Bleeding from the nose. One step before blackout and possible coma.

“Think it’s time you stopped, kid. You won’t do yourself or me any good if you kill yourself.”

Sobbing at last, adding tear-track trickles to the lines running down my cheeks behind the mask, I put my hand over what passed as my face in that dim room, and smeared it with the blood it deserved to carry. All I could see was the ragged patchwork of Monga’s back, crisscrossed with gruesome healed and half-healed and stitched canyons of flesh. A revolting quilt I couldn’t make right.

“It’s going to be alright, kid.” The deep, gruntle affirmation did nothing to reassure me. A patent should not comfort his healer.

Unable to even wipe my tears away on my arm, I felt my way with blind fingers to my bundle of supplies and returned with pain medication. Monga took it without complaint or resistance, and I fluttered my hands, trying to weave a sign, trying to conjure some _chakra_ from a strained heart that would not allow it.

Bracing myself upright with one hand on the floor, I wept a little more, then took in a shuddering breath and let it out. “R-rest, if you can, M-monga- _sama_. You should t-try not to move.”

“Sure, kid.” This rumble only made me want to break down into fresh sobs at the sheer stupidity and pointlessness of my own admonition. It wouldn’t matter if he tried to follow my direction or not, and we both knew it. They would move him soon enough, whether or not it would break open his wounds like overripe fruit.

“Go on, kid,” Monga said at last. “Get outta here.”

My hand was on my mask again, doing nothing to repress my feeling. “N-name!” I gasped. “H-have a n-name!”

“Yeah. Owl. Get lost, Owl.”

The words galvanized me. I put a comforting hand on his shoulder, then wavered, as I climbed to my feet and staggered in numb, drunk weaves to the door. I managed to make it out into the hall before crashing into the wall and pitching to the floor. Everything was numb. I was awake but lacked all feeling.

Even Ape’s voice seemed to call from far away. “Get a medic!”

_Yes, get a medic for the medic…_

The irony would have had me burbling a laugh, but I was in no mood. Ape came toward me but stopped when I started raising myself on hands and knees. Somehow, I put myself on my backside up against the wall, then began to push myself up, using my slick palms on the smooth stone to do it.

“No need, Ape- _san_. I do not require your help.”

The man stiffened, as if sensing he knew I did not want him anywhere near me. Would have cried out at the touch of his hand.

I hardly paid him mind. I didn’t have the energy. Leaving bloody handprints behind, I propelled myself foot by foot to my room and the sweet bliss of ignorant sleep.

Once more, it was a rapping, which woke me. I sat bolt upright with my hair askew, my tongue dried to the roof of my mouth, and my mind heavy and lagged from _chakra_ over-use. “Mehhh!” I articulated, as the knock came again and I stumbled out of my bed to wrench the door open, my body sagging in the frame. Only my arms, braced on the wood, keeping me from falling into the man outside.

“I-inoichi- _sama_.”

“Kitō.” Green eyes examined me. “I was told you haven’t been answering your door for meals.”

My face screwed into a frown at him, even as my stomach betrayed me with a growl at the thought of missed meals. The last I remembered was dragging myself along walls, to the stark surprise of several _shinobi_ walking the halls, until I could fall into my room. “W-what? No one but you knocked, Inoichi- _sama_.”

At least, not that I knew of… I very well could have been comatose for several hours.

“They have, Kitō, and I’m glad to see you on your feet, now. We will require your assistance this evening.”

A low, little sound came out of me at this, and I took one hand from a wall to cover my face. The image of Monga was black on my mind. Yet, “Yes, Inoichi- _sama_ ,” was all I said past my hand.

“You should get ready, Kitō. I’ll see to it you get some food.”

“Yes, Inoichi- _sama_ ,” I moaned again, but he was already gone.

Leaving me alone to fully become conscience of memory, each piece another splinter under my skin, calling me to dig them out. To free myself of the burning _requirement_ of my flesh. It had to be done, if I hoped to survive whatever would happen to Monga between that moment and the evening, when they called me to fix it. So, I determined to relieve myself quickly, before someone else knocked on my door.

Despite my attempt at swiftness and not cutting too much, I had only just sealed the last laceration I’d made on my thighs when a pounding, not to be denied, erupted on my door. Squeaking in still half muddled fright, I tripped out of the bathroom, to jerk the door open, yet again.

“Inoichi- _sama_!”

Of all the people I expected to see bringing me food, his hair perfect and eyes like glass, it wasn’t the head of the Yamanaka Clan. Judging from his face, as that flat, green gaze traveled over my form, clad only in underwear and a night shirt, rumpled, with swaths of bright red blood, I hadn’t been able to wash away yet, coating my legs, I wasn’t as he expected, either. My cheeks heated, both with shame and an odd indignation. A feeling I had little experience with.

Part of me wanted to scream at him, but I could not. The rest of me remembering he was only doing his duty, too.

_Hound, Lynx, Viper, Crane._

Four other lives I did not see, but which hung in this horrid balance.

“Can I come in, Kitō?”

“Of course, Inoichi- _sama_ ,” I murmured, backing up to give him access.

The other man came in, scanning my room before setting the tray he carried down on the bedside table. My face flamed harder, knowing what he saw. A room a tangle of discarded gear. Gloves thrown in a corner, pants and shirt in another, mask lying face down between haphazardly balanced shoes. All of it laying where I’d tossed it in my frenzy to be rid of it and all of it still stained with dried, browning blood.

Yet, I raised my head and clenched my jaw when he turned to look at me. “I will be ready when I am needed, Inoichi- _sama_ ,” I said.

Another sweep of his eyes over me. “I’m glad to see you haven’t forgotten your duty, Kitō.”

I felt myself bristle. “You do not understand _Iryō-nin_ , Inoichi- _sama_. I will be ready when I am needed.” The words were low but seemed to hit at something in the other man.

He acknowledged me with a jerk of his chin. “I’ll send someone for you when it’s time.”

My eyes followed him, as he left. When the door clicked closed, I shrieked into my hands and spin toward the shower. The water was a miracle on my skin but did nothing but drum on my throbbing head. The aftereffects of _chakra_ exhaustion were akin to the worst kinds of hangovers. I ticked off migraine, light sensitivity, and padded, disjointed, thought processes as my main symptoms.

Unlike a hangover, _chakra_ exhaustion and over-use didn’t leave you nauseous. It left you _starving_. To the point it felt like every part of your body _craved_ food. Once out of the bathroom, I fell on the food Inoichi had brought me like some famished thing. The meal wasn’t light, but I still wished there was more when it was gone. In my estimation, it would take several meals and long periods of sleep to fully recoup.

Which was why I did everything in my power to keep myself from heaving when I picked up my ANBU gear with the thought I would have to put it on again, and face what they had done to Monga. It would do neither of us any good for me to be weak. I _needed_ every bit of _chakra_ my body could muster.

I had time to ponder this while I did my best to wash away the blood stains on my clothes. To ponder my need of energy and to wonder just how long I’d been able to sleep. Long I guessed, if I had missed several visits from the Intelligence Division’s _shinobi_. Ten hours? Twelve? Certainly not longer, given the way time weighed on the matter at hand.

Dressed, gear damp and still badly discolored, I held my owl mask in my hands, between my knees, as I sat on the unmade bed. At least Monga had had time to rest a little. Not much, but a little. My fingers turned the porcelain over and over, the light reflecting off its surface. The blood I’d painted it with had washed off, but…

I thought of how I’d crouched over Monga and shouted defiance at Inoichi. My hands paused with the mask on its side and my fingers through the eye holes. Where… were my loyalties?

_My only enemy is suffering._

_Hound, Lynx, Viper, Crane, Monga…_

_Monga…_

“Clause one, _Daiikkō_ …” I said, standing. Deep considerations weren’t my concern. _Iryō-nin_ were simple beings. I had one mission. To heal. “I will care for you, Monga- _sama_ …” The words were a whisper, as I strapped the mask into place.

My sense of surety lasted only until I was summoned to Monga’s holding cell and I found myself shivering outside it, facing Ape and Cobra.

“Owl- _san_ ,” Ape acknowledged me.

I returned this greeting with a nod of my head and stepped up to the door. “I will go in now, Ape- _san_.”

With no words, Ape let me in to the dim space. On the threshold, everything I’d built up for the moment was snapped. A smell assaulted my nose. A sickening scent of cooked meat. Singed hair and burnt flesh. Something all too akin to beef being fried. The room was hot with it and I didn’t need to _see_ Monga to know what I would find.

Something in me wanted to moan, to break, to give in and pull the rest of me down in a tumbled wreck, but I only stood. Locked stiff with Ape beside me and Cobra behind me.

“Owl- _san_ ,” Ape began, reaching a hand to touch my upper arm.

Breathing heavy through my mouth, I spun and slapped the hand away. “Were you here when they did this?!”

The masked man, the elite _shinobi_ , backed away from me, body tense. “That isn’t your concern, Owl- _san_.”

I paid this no mind, stocking after him, making him retreat, though I was half a head shorter than he was. “Do you stand outside the door while he creams?! Do you?!”

He stopped me at last, grasping both my shoulders. “Owl- _san_. Get a hold of yourself. You have work to do.”

Gasping up at him, my hands clenched and unclenched. Spasmatic. “Do not tell me about my work, Ape- _san_.” He could have held me but let me shrug out from under his hands. “You may wait outside. I do not require your help.”

Ape stiffened again at this and exchanged a look with Cobra. “I don’t think that’s a good idea, Owl- _san_.”

“Do you fear for my safety? Your only purpose is to look after my welfare, and I do not require you. I will call you if I have need of you.”

A tense moment, then both ANBU walked out and left me in the shadows with the smell of burns and pain. I didn’t cry when I went to Monga. Didn’t scream. Just dropped my fingers lightly on his shoulder, to rouse him.

“Monga- _sama_.”

He lay on his side, wrists still in manacles. His back had broken open in several places, but his chest and feet were the real issues. Angry burns laid in wide strips across the expanse of his chest and the soles of his feet. From the lingering tang of hot iron on the air, I could only imagine they’d used brands to do it.

But, despite it all, Monga’s eyes fluttered open at my touch and he proved to have been conscience all along. “Hey, Owl,” he grunted. “I’m beginning to take that whole don’t come between a medic and his patient thing seriously. You sure made them scurry.”

A flush took me at the words, a blush of shame that burned up my cheeks, as I settled at Monga’s feet. Head hanging, I let my hands begin their work, words slipping out of me in a murmur. “I… was upset. It is not Ape- _san’s_ fault.”

“Upset?” he rumbled. “Why? They’re your friends, this is your village.”

The _chakra_ circling my hands went out as if a switch had been turned off. The shame painting my cheeks was replaced with that flare of some other hot emotion. The seldom felt or indulged one, which had had me staring down ANBU only minutes before. An unbecoming, selfish emotion, which turned me loud and left me pale.

My hands were splayed on the floor and my head was down between my elbows, face tucked away to hide my own hate of myself, as I screamed, “Friends! Villages! Enemies! All I see are ways we have made to hate and hurt!” My fist went up and struck the floor with a snap like dry wood. “Why are there so many ways to hurt each other?!”

Monga’s breath caught. Then he swore. “Shit. Your hand.”

I rocked back onto my knees, panting, cradling my left hand with my right. Glanced at the fingers that dripped blood listlessly. “I don’t... understand why there are so many ways to hurt each other, Monga- _sama_.”

“I don’t understand why you just broke your fucking hand,” he snapped.

“It’s only a finger, Monga- _sama_ ,” I said, wanly. Calm again, I only felt drained. Wincing, I straightened the finger, which was cocked at an awkward angle, and began repairing the break. “I am sorry, Monga- _sama_. I should be caring for you.”

He growled another expletive and watched my finger mend under my own ministrations. “I ain’t got nothing going on, k- Owl. I can wait.”

I began shaking my head, biting my lip to hold back the hitch starting in my breathing, and he sighed. “You snap a finger and don’t make a sound, but you’ll start crying over making me wait.” A pause. “You really don’t care I’m an _Iwa shinobi_ , do you?”

“No, Monga- _sama_ , I don’t.” Stopping the flow of _chakra,_ I was using on myself, I flexed my left hand. The finger I’d broken was stiff, but usable again, and I turned my attention back on Monga’s feet, where the worst of the damage was. “Even if our positions were reversed, I would still heal you.”

A huff of breath. “You mean, if you were a prisoner being tortured in the Hidden Stone, you’d still heal me?” The words were bitter and hard-edged.

My answer was simple. “Yes, Monga- _sama_. I would heal you, even if I knew you would kill me for it.” It was thoughtless, really. My concentration was on mending the sensitive areas of his feet that had been tormented, and I let out the truth, not considering his reaction.

“The fuck are you?!” he burst out. “You say that like the thought of death doesn’t bother you!”

Shifting my attention from one foot to the other, I did not spare a glance for him. “It doesn’t, Monga- _sama_.”

“Well, why the hell not?!”

I made a small sound but was silent a moment beyond that. The green glow of my healing _chakra_ flickered on the plains of my ANBU mask and Monga watched me. His scrutiny unnerving. What was it he could even see in me with my face covered? Or, was he waiting to read my voice?

“Why? Because _Iryō-nin_ are taught to die every day, Monga- _sama_ ,” I said, at last. “Medics… are not allowed to fight, so most think we do not know what it is to give our lives for nation and village, but, for us, there is no nation and no village. To an _Iryō-nin_ , the whole of nation and village are contained in the life of whatever patient we are treating, and we would give our lives to save theirs, as easily as we offer them our _chakra_. It is the entirety of our purpose in existence. And… in a way. We _do_ die as we heal. _Chakra_ is life, and we give our _chakra_ to those we heal, dying with each life we touch, draining ourselves into others because their lives are of more importance than our own. ‘The lives of others come before your own,’ is something all _Iryō-nin_ learn quickly.

“I-” I sunk my teeth into my lip behind the porcelain. “I do not mind it, Monga- _sama_. It is my only use.”

“Shit,” he muttered, and looked away.

The exchange left me off balance, mostly because Monga went so quiet after. He didn’t say a word, until I’d healed the burns on his feet and chest and moved on to further repairing his back. Resealing all the open wounds and further healing the rest, so I could take out the haphazard sprawl of stitches I’d placed there. Only then did he turn an eye on me and snap, “Would you talk to me? You’re no good when you’re quiet, Owl; it’s like you’re not even here.”

“T-talk about what, M-monga- _sama_?” I stammered, fingers stilling.

“Anything. I sit here in the silence too much, as it is. You’re the only one who does talk to me around here.” His teeth snapped over the words, and he looked away again, as if he’d said something wrong. Something he shouldn’t.

It made me want to comfort him, and I had no idea how to do that, beyond complying with what he’d asked. So, I began rambling stupidly and hurriedly about my life, my training as an _Iryō-nin_ and _Iryō-Butai_. As I worked to remedy the damage I’d been unable to fix on my last visit, I told him how I’d left my home and traveled across the Land of Fire with a group of Leaf _shinobi_ because their medic had said I showed promise. I told him how the Academy had been for a pre- _genin_ everyone had said had no right to be there, and about being alone, until I’d finally been moved to direct medical training, where I’d proven I had some worth, at least.

There were things I skipped in my narrative, but twenty years of life were easy to tell when you hadn’t done much with them. “I’m… I’m just really rather boring, Monga- _sama_ ,” I finished in a rush.

“Sure.” The word was snort.

“W-what?”

“You’re being idiotically modest. Do you even know how rare it is for a man born outside a hidden village to be admitted and trained in any form of _ninjutsu_? And you’re telling me you _knew how_ to use _chakra_ to heal when you were a bloody kid in some no name village on the border of the Land of Fire.”

“Only enough to heal minor cuts and bruises, Monga- _sama_ ,” I said with some unease. “I- I wanted to be useful, and had heard how _nin_ used _chakra_ to heal, so I taught myself. There was so much pain in my village…”

“Taught yourself… I don’t get you, Owl,” he muttered. “Not one bit.”

“I- I’m just myself, Monga- _sama_. Just… Just…”

“Owl,” he concluded.

A sound like heartbreak pushed out of my throat, and my hands, freed of their work, clenched on my thighs. “Yes, Monga- _sama_ ,” I agreed, head sinking, even as the words escaped.

“You really don’t like being called that, do you?” This question was flat, as if Monga was attempting to follow a script laid out for him. A script he resented but found himself following all the same.

 _It’s alright, Monga-_ sama _!_

The words I should have said, the words it should have been easy to say, plaid in my mind like a taunt. Because none of it was alright. Not the captured ANBU, whose lives weighed on Monga’s breaking. Not the necessity of the _Iwa-nin’s_ suffering, or the horror of what my own fellow _Konoha shinobi_ were capable of with serene, unaffected demeanors. And, as much as most of me wanted to offer the comfortable, normal lie, it was not those words which crashed out of me, cresting another wave of my shameful anger.

“I never asked for this, Monga- _sama_! Never asked to have my face behind a mask! Never wanted to be a _Yōkai-nin_!” I ended on a gasp, bent over my knees with the porcelain of my ANBU mask almost pressed to the floor. I was dizzy because I’d expanded all my air and my lungs felt heavy, hot behind my ribs. The floor swam and I gave in to it, letting my forehead connect with the stone with an audible click of one hardened surface on another. “I… only ever wanted to heal, Monga- _sama_.”

It was as though I was asking his forgiveness, kneeling there, but I didn’t fight it. Wasn’t it right? Didn’t someone deserve to be made humble and abject themselves to this man in apology for all that had been done to him? If that was to be me, then I would bare it.

“Monga- _sama_ , I-”

“I don’t got anything else to call you, Owl. Unless you want me to go back to calling you kid.” The husky words cut through my attempt to beg pardon.

Slowly, I lifted myself from my prostrate position. “Owl… is alright, Monga- _sama_ ” If he wished to brush aside my offer of submission, I would not fight that, either.

“And _Yōkai-nin_ ,” he huffed. “What is that, some kind of slur?”

I felt my face heat behind my mask, flushing, even as I looked down at my hands resting on my thighs. A raw, burning urge was growing under my skin, and it was with effort I kept myself from scrubbing my hands over my scars. “It- It is what my fellow _Iryō-nin_ call one of our own who works with ANBU…”

“Eeekk, so it is a slur, then. And you’re a phantom, now, huh?”

“Y-yes, Monga- _sama_. It… it is… alright.”

“Bullshit.” It was said low, but there was nothing to hide the fact it was a snap. A reprimand. It made me flinch. “If it was alright, you wouldn’t be bitching and getting upset about it.”

Biting my lip, my fingers curled to fists, my nails dragging over the scars, so close under the fabric of my pants. I wanted relief so badly. “Yes, Monga- _sama_.”

There was silence for a while, apart from Monga’s rasping breathing. I looked over at him to see his eyes were closed. He looked far from comfortable, but, perhaps, as relaxed as I’d ever seen him. Weighted sorrow expanded in my chest, and I saw my hand going to touch his shoulder again, as if in a dream. I certainly didn’t consciously reach to make contact with his skin, but I found I couldn’t help myself.

His eyes jerked open, to take me in, and I almost wrenched my hand back at their intensity, but despite the shudder that went through me, I let the contact linger between us. “Is… Is there anything else I can do for you, Monga- _sama_?”

A twitching, restless expression had overcome his face. As if he were considering snarling at me and shaking off my hand, but somehow found he couldn’t. “Naw, there’s not. Get out of here, Owl.”

“Yes, Monga- _sama_.”

I stood and began making my way to the door. Only to have my steps falter. _Owl…_ My shoulders slumped and my head sank. The name hung like a divider between us. A barrier. As solid and fragile as the mask over my face.

_Owl._

It was hateful. A sign of all the things I despised in this mission I found myself preforming in. Something that clung to me and made me repellent to myself.

And a thing which left Monga utterly alone. _You’re the only one who talks to me around here._ His words plagued me. I, this man whose name he did not know, whose face he had never seen, was his only comfort in this place. Yet, even I was cruel to him in my way. Even I was one of his torturers. A wretched part of me understood the necessity of trying to pry the location of the captured ANBU from him, but my healer’s heart would not allow me to understand the need to isolate him so in the dark. To reduce this man, who was surely a great _shinobi_ , to a bloodied thing on the ground.

I couldn’t stand it.

It was abhorrent.

Yet, even so, I _allowed_ it. I did nothing to stop it, even if I did not raise my hand in direct harm of him, my apathy in standing by while he suffered condoned all that was done to him. My own pacifism rendered me as guilty as if I were the one who had ruined Monga’s back or pressed the irons to his skin. And I gave him so little in exchange. A few moments of peace. A rambled story of a childhood that did not matter.

And, lifting a trembling hand to the doorframe, to support myself, to keep my suddenly weak legs from giving way, I wondered what it mattered if the name and life of one medical _nin_ was compromised. Beyond the betrayal of my duty it would entail. I was not worth much, in the end, even if by some miracle Monga was rescued or allowed to leave the lower regions of the Intelligence Division, it would not matter if I was taken or killed. I could be replaced. And was not my crime, my accepted guilt in Monga’s pain worthy of such a punishment, if it came?

“M-monga- _sama_?” My voice was hoarse, hardly to be heard. But Monga did hear it, somehow.

“Yeah, Owl?” His words were tired, worn. Frayed at the edges.

“My-” I paused, the last of my trepidation holding me a moment. “My name is Kitō.”

Then I was walking out the door, my head spinning and my heart pounding. The last thing I heard before the door closed behind me was the hissing intake of Monga’s breath. And why not? I had just gone against my village and my mission. Shattered whatever meaning my temporary ANBU credentials held. I felt I would faint, but I held myself steady, until I reached my room.

Only then and there did I allow myself to slide to the floor with my back to the door and scream into my hands. The weight of what I had just done crushed me, while my need clawed at me. Hooked talons tearing at my mind, until I drew my own blood to sate the beast and ease the pressure.

Yet, for the first time since I had begun turning my own hands against myself and finding solace in my red blood, the cuts gave me no relief. Looking at the crimson coating my hands, I wondered how much blood would be enough. Where would it stop? With Monga? The captured ANBU team? A dozen others? A hundred? More?

I doubled up over my cut-up thighs and my knees, weeping wildly into my hands, smearing blood on my face. What could one medic, who had already gone against his duty, do in the face of it all? And duty? Duty to _Konoha_? Hadn’t I told Monga for an _Iryō-nin_ there was no nation and no village? Only the one they healed in the moment?

My hands went to my hair and I gripped it, sending pain through its roots, even as I squeezed my eyes shut and I moaned. “I- I just want to heal!”

But there would be no healing without further pain, and I could not sit on the floor forever. I sealed the cuts over and showered in preparation to sleep, dreading the next summons to Monga’s cell. And wishing I knew where to find food in the place without it having to be brought to me. I was starving again, and my _chakra_ reserves were low. Low enough I could sometimes feel my heart palpitate and my head grow light.

The bed called to me, though, and I knew I would have to wait. Wait for everything. Food and the call to attend Monga alike. Towel draped around my waist, hair still damp from the warm water, I shuffled toward the bed. Only to be stopped by a light knock on the door.

I blinked at the sound, wavering on my feet. My sense of time had been a bit screwed since my bout of _chakra_ exhaustion and coma-like sleep, and this had been compounded by the Intelligence Division having no windows, but I thought it was night. There should have been no reason for someone to be at my door. Unless, perhaps they had come to bring food.

The possibility of it had my heavy feet shuffling toward the door. Though I tried to hurry, the knock was repeated before I was able to open the door to stare in confusion at the masked ANBU in the hall. He was one I had not seen before and his hands were empty, betraying my hope of food.

“A-ANBU- _san_?” I queried, stammering, as I tried to make sense of why he was there. “What can I do for you, ANBU- _san_?”

“You are required in Monga’s cell, Owl- _san_.” The voice was young and steady and clear, but the words left me blank and uncomprehending. Left me blinking yet more, as though I _were_ some owl caught out in the daylight.

“But I’ve only just left Monga- _sama’s_ cell.” Surely it could not have been more than two hours since I’d turned traitor on my village and told him my name.

“Yes, Owl- _san_.” The young ANBU spoke slow, as if addressing a child. “You are required in Monga’s cell again.”

This at last, broke my stupor and hard realization dawned in a bitter slap. _I_ was _needed_ again. They had not allowed him rest because, this too, was a form of torture for the mind.

The knowledge inserted a heft of ice down the length of my spine, bringing me fully awake and alert, and propelling me to spin away from the man at my door. Crying out, I dashed into my room and began scrambling to find and pull on my gear. My eyes were half blinded with hot tears and my hands trembled, but I was not distracted enough to miss the ANBU leaning in to watch me with startled eyes, before deciding his duty was done and exciting with a quick, determined step. Obviously, not wanting to deal with a distraught medical _nin_.

Tired as I was, it did not take me long to gather myself and my things and go back to Monga’s room. As if they never left, either to eat or sleep, Ape and Cobra stood sentry, still. I burst past them both, only saying, “I do not require your help!” as I flew by the flabbergasted men.

I could not have waited on them, even if I’d wanted to. Monga’s moans could be heard down the hall, and all I could think, with pounding heart, was I had never heard him make a sound of complaint before. Not even when they’d ripped his back open.

The room was blessedly empty, and Ape and Cobra did not attempt to follow me in. Monga lay almost as I’d left him, but he was curled in on himself, cradling his manacled hands to his chest. And why shouldn’t he be? As I dropped down to my knees beside him, I saw they were broken. The fingers bent off at odd angles, making them look like grotesque stick things, made in disturbing parody of hands by a deranged artist. The sight made me cry out in horror and despair, and Monga looked up at me, face contorted in pain.

“H-hey, K-kitō. Been awhile.”

This only made me weep and I cursed the mask, which would not allow me to wipe away the blinding tears. They only impaired me and left Monga to be in pain longer.

“Do not joke, Monga- _sama_!” I wailed, hands gripping his shoulders. “I can’t stand it!”

A panting grunt was all I got in return, and I shook my head, to fling away my tears. Then, for some time, I was too focused on meticulously mending each tiny, fractured bone to think of much else.

When it was done, I sank to the floor. Simply toppling over and rolling unto my back to stare, listless, at the shadow-cloaked ceiling. Monga stirred a bit at my side. His breathing had evened, and his voice was almost normal when he spoke. “You okay… Kitō.”

As if it were somewhat hard to say my name.

“Mehh! Y-yes, Monga- _sama_.” Yet, my slurring must have undone my reassurance.

“Sure, you are,” he huffed. But he didn’t say anything else. Didn’t tell me to leave. His silence was weighted. As if he held something back by mere force of will. Something which was slipping and needed only a gentle nudge to break free from his control.

I didn’t feel I had the strength to ponder it. Tears of exhaustion and overwrought sorrow were coursing down my face. They trickled over my cheeks and fell, to spatter on the stone floor. I let them go unabashedly. Another time I would regret my weakness, but in the moment, I had no energy for it.

It was this which prompted me to level myself up and hold my head in my hands. “I- I should go, Monga- _sama_.”

He was silent a moment, that weighted feeling brooding around him. I wanted to give him comfort, to give him more than healing and a few words, but I felt stripped bare, and oh so empty. Physically and mentally, I had nothing left to give. Lowering my hands to the floor, I tried to gather myself to stand. Before I could find my feet, Monga spoke, at last.

“Can you stay with me awhile, Kitō? Can you just stay?”

His voice was a growl and it startled me, as much as his words. It was a desperate thing, that plea, and angry too. As if he did not _want_ to say those simple sentences, so full of human desire, but could not hold himself back. Not with the prospect of being left alone. Not with the knowledge, as soon as I left, they could come again and strip him down to nothing. His pain and display of frailty were worse than anything I endured in myself. Yet, I couldn’t ignore my own feelings, either.

Whimpering, I brought my hands back up to cover the mask I wore and bent over my lap. It hurt so bad. The exhaustion and the continuous stress of it. I had hardly been allowed rest and food enough to recharge my _chakra_ reserves and continue my work, much less to relieve the residual effects of _chakra_ overuse. While medics were used to running on short reserves and being overtaxed, not even the strongest _Iryō-nin_ could do it forever.

Hunkered there, listening to Monga’s roughened breathing and feeling every tense, stretched, _brittle_ line in my body, I knew I was far from the strongest of my kind. I was weak, I was soft. I had hardly been out of the village since I’d arrived there in the hopes of joining the Academy, except on a few, easy missions. I spent my days in healing and much of my spare time in reading and research. My body could take only so much, and it was near its limits.

But I had been asked to do something and I was compelled to see it through to the best of my ability. So, I sat there, in pain, only slightly less than Monga’s, and let my presence give him whatever comfort or security he felt it offered. It could not be much, I was sure. Not when I was little more than a tightly curled ball of medical _nin_ , doing his best not to topple over again.

How long this excruciating experience lasted, I wasn’t sure. Neither of us spoke. And we did not touch each other. We merely coexisted. He lay and I sat. Sat until my vision darkened and I felt a telling line of hot, viscous something running down my upper lip from my nose.

Moaning and putting out a hand to keep myself from falling, I lingered a moment more. Then, I gasped out, “I c-can’t. I- I just can’t. I- I need to sleep, M-monga- _sama_.”

And I wished I could explain how I could not do it there. I’d already done too much in staying, when I’d already completed my work and should have gone. Doing more would produce nothing good for either of us. “S-sorry! I’m s-sorry, Monga- _sama_!”

He grunted, a deep but frayed sound in the near dark. A sound betraying his own weariness as well as my own once imagination that surely this ordeal could not last long. That surely this captured _Iwa-nin_ would quickly divulge the location of the imprisoned ANBU team and I would not need become intimate with his pain, or the unapologetic cruelty of my own fellow Leaf _shinobi_. A small sound, but one pregnant with so many unuttered things, it broke some of the last holds I had on my flagging mental state, and I found myself kneeling before him again.

“S-sorry,” I wept. “I- I’m s-sorry, M-monga- _s-sama_. I- I c-can stay.”

“The hell you can,” he rumbled. “I can smell blood, and it ain’t mine. Get lost, Kitō. Scram. I’ll be seeing you again soon.”

But this only left me clenching my hands to fists and clenching my eyes closed over tears, as I sobbed like a broken thing. Sobbed for us both, until Monga sighed an aggrieved exhale and put his newly mended hands in my hair.

“Get out of here, Kitō. You’re not any good to either of us when you’re like this. Go rest, while you can.”

At the end of myself or not, it seemed I still had the capacity to feel shame. That _he_ should be comforting _me_ was the worst possible disgrace. “So sorry,” I whispered.

“Yeah.” He said, sighing again. “I think we both are. Now, beat it.”

I don’t remember how I stood or how I made my way to my room. Whether I did so on my own or if I required help, I can never recall. All I know is, when I woke, I was stiff and curled into a tight ball, clutching a pillow to my chest. My mouth was dry and my tongue thick and heavy. My head rang, and I made no attempt to move, though I dry sobbed into the pillow I held for slender comfort.

Whatever time it was I didn’t know. Somewhere, I’d even lost track of the days. All I knew was I was still dozing in that fashion when a knock came at my door. I groaned, coiling further around the pillow pressed to my chest because I did not want to answer that summons. There were only limited reasons someone would be there, trying to get my attention, and I wanted none of them.

Not food or questions or the command to attend to Monga. I wanted sleep. I wanted oblivion. _Nothing._ I wanted nothing.

“Kitō?” A pause. The shifting of floorboards under heavy weight. “Kitō? I’m coming in.”

Somehow, I managed to pry my dry, crusted eyes open in time to see Inoichi step in and stop in place at the sight of me. A tangle of blankets around a mostly bare body, short, dark hair matted to my cheeks, and a blurred expression. A singular mess.

My face flamed and I struggled to sit up, pulling the covers into my lap with one hand and pressing the other to my head, to repress the dizziness there. “Inoichi- _sama_ ,” I slurred. Then I shook my head and pushed one hand into the mattress, while I leaned over my folded legs. The blood drained out of my face, leaving me pale, and I felt I would faint for a moment. And wouldn’t that have added embarrassment on embarrassment?

I felt my cheeks heat under my pallor, struggling for another flush against my light headedness. Inoichi noted it, this juxtaposition in my features and the extreme tiredness in my demeanor. When he spoke, his voice was low, almost soothing.

“I understand you’re worn out, Kitō, but are you still able to perform your duty? We will require your services in a few hours.”

There it was. The reason for Inoichi coming to check on me. And, there also, was my chance to stall or refuse. Was I capable of preforming my duty? I could beg for time to recover, I could profess the truth, I was at my limit and would find it difficult to continue, if I was pushed in the current manner for much longer.

It was my chance for excusable weakness, and yet…

 _Hound, Lynx, Viper, Crane. Monga._ As well as whatever nameless _Iryō-nin_ would need to replace me, should I give in. All of these would be affected by what I chose to speak in the next moment. And, sitting there, my head spinning, I knew there had never been any real chance I would renege on my duty. Only the wistful imagination of it.

Looking up at the head of the Analyses Team through watering eyes, I half moaned out, “Food, Inoichi- _sama_. I- I need food.”

He nodded, his green eyes hard and appraising. “I’ll see that you get it, and that you are alerted when we need you. Take the time between to prepare, Kitō.” One more sweep over me with his eyes, and he turned on his heels with a _scratch_ of hard-soled shoe on smooth floorboards.

When my door clicked shut behind him, I crumbled into the sheets. I allowed myself this weakness for a little while, but only a little while. The ANBU who brought my meal found me sitting at the table, fully dressed in my gear with my head in my hands and my mask beside me on the tabletop. He found me in the same position again when he came to summon me to Monga’s cell.

I went without complaint or comment. My only comfort the fact I could not hear Monga crying out before I entered his cell, as I had the previous visit. It was a slim comfort. Monga’s pained pants and gasps filled the space and his fevered skin leaked slick sweat.

They had not bothered with assaulting his flesh and drawing blood. They’d just poisoned him.

“Oh, Monga- _sama_ ,” I murmured, kneeling beside him.

He grunted but said nothing all the while I neutralized the poison in his veins and imparted to him as much extra _chakra_ as I could spare to ease him. Compared to other times I had healed the _Iwa-nin_ , the operation was a simple one. Sighing, I rocked back on my knees after only a short time. The man was laying quiet with his eyes closed, but his face was pinched with remembered pain.

The sight and his silence made me take my lip between my teeth. The urge to offer him comfort was like a physical pull toward the man. I swayed, torn between the thought I should leave and my own healer’s instincts to stay. It would have been easier if he just _spoke_ to me. But he said nothing. Leaving me to twist my sore hands in my lap, until I at last couldn’t hold my peace any longer.

“M-monga- _sama_.” My fingers clenched, nails digging into my palms. “If-”

“Get lost.”

I jerked. The words were rough and nothing but angry. I’d never heard him speak like that before, not even at our first meeting, and I rocked back, one hand slipping off my legs to brace on the floor. “M-monga- _sama-_ ”

“Stop calling me that shit and scram. I don’t want you around.”

This was like a slap. A sting started in my eyes and my vision blurred and doubled. “H-have I done something wrong, Monga- _sama_?”

His eyes came open, making me recoil from the fire in them. “Yeah. You showed up. Now, beat it.”

Crying quiet, but shuddering tears, I lurched to my feet. It wasn’t until I was partway to the door his curse stopped me.

“Fuck!”

It was raw and full of hurt, and my feet stalled. Though I could not bring myself to turn around, I could not leave either. So, I wavered between the two choices, body shivering, and eyes crying because the rejection hurt when it shouldn’t.

“They’re using you, kid.” The statement was beyond tired. Beyond exhausted. It was a frayed thing at the absolute end of itself. A thing which both begged forgiveness and railed against being uttered. It shocked me. The raw emotion as much as the words and the name he hadn’t called me in so long.

Slow, I turned on one foot, so I was half facing Monga and half poised to leave. My tears had dried-up, but my eyes were wide. “Waaa- What?” A weak, pathetic collection of sounds.

“Your little pack of ANBU. That Inoichi and his pet, Ibiki. They’re using you.”

“I- I don’t understand.” And my heart fluttered like a trapped bird sensing a hand closing on it. Something in me knew I did not want to understand. That I might break or go mad if Monga told me the truth I did not know.

“It’s an old trick,” he grunted, ignoring or not seeing my panic. “Hurt a man, until he almost loses his mind but have one person be nice to him. Man’s more likely to talk to someone who’s kind to him, even if he knows it’s a trick. Especially if that kind person’s suffering too. Or, did you think it was coincidence you’ve been run so hard when it would have made more sense to have two _Iryō-nin_ from the start?” Those weary, dark eyes focused on me. “They got someone better than they thought when they picked you, though, kid.”

“No.” A whimper. I stepped back, that unimaginable understanding taking hold of me and seeming to drop the floor out from under me. “I- T-they wouldn’t-”

“Don’t believe me; go ask them. Bet that Inoichi- _sama_ of yours can tell you how it is.”

I back peddled, as if repelled. Tripping over my own feet, until I fell against the door, chest heaving, as I tried to draw in breath. Another whimper was working its way up my throat when the door at my back was pulled open and I fell with a cry into Ape’s arms.

“Owl- _san_ ,” he said, steadying me. “We heard a crash on the door and entered to check on you.” The man cast a glance over Monga. “Are you alright, Owl- _san_?”

All I could do was tilt my head back and look up at him. This man I had once challenged and chased away. Or, had that, too, been nothing but play? Slowly, my head began to turn from side to side, a lagged sign of negation. His hands on me felt like stings, though they were light and easy, and I pushed them off, brushed them away from my skin in a manner both languid and stunned.

Where was the truth in all the lies, I wondered, backing away from the two startled ANBU centuries at Monga’s door. I was so tangled up; I could no longer see which way was up or decipher my own cruelty.

I half expected one of the ANBU to chase me when I turned and ran. I expected restraining hands and to cry out while they crushed me against the wall. But none of that happened. They let me go. Perhaps knowing I would not go far.

Coming to myself was painful. I woke sitting in a corner, in some dark part of the Intelligence Division, my legs drawn up to my chest, my mask resting on my thighs, and my hands dangling over my knees.

I hurt. I ached in a way, which had nothing to do with physical pain, but that set off twinges of discomfort all the same. Much of me did not want to get up, would have preferred to remain curled up in a tight knot of denial, but this was something my nature would not allow. I was _Iryō-nin_ , I healed, and I did not think of myself.

“Monga- _sama_ …” I whimpered into the mask I wore, trying to press my face closer to my legs for comfort, but unable to push past that barrier. If I was being used as a weapon against him, I wanted to know it.

Letting my hands slip down from my knees, to wrap around my legs and tighten there, until I contained my shaking, I buried my head and screamed. My body was limp when it was done, when I’d vented this sound of despair. Limp and spent, and I sprawled against the wall. But only for a while.

Fighting my bubbling tears, I pulled myself up, using the wall for leverage. I was lost in the maze of the Intelligence Division for a short time, but I was determined, and hadn’t gone as far from known territory as I first thought. A few wrong turns and double backs brought me to hallways I knew. From there, it was easy to find Monga’s cell.

Ape and Cobra exchanged a look when I approached but said nothing, until I addressed them.

“I need to speak to Inoichi- _sama_.”

“He’s resting, Owl- _san_ ,” Ape returned, stepping toward me. “I can inform him you…” His voice trailed away when I stepped back and fixed him with a masked gaze.

For one moment I was glad of the porcelain covering my face. “I need to speak to Inoichi- _sama_ , Ape- _san_ ,” I repeated. “Please take me to him. I will take the responsibility for disturbing him.” My quiet calm was the same form of attitude I had used when I’d chased Ape from Monga’s room. And, maybe, that hadn’t been all lie.

The man shuffled from foot to foot, demeanor saying he wasn’t sure what to do with the medical _nin_ staring him down.

“Take him.”

My eyes flicked to Cobra, and I realized, with a lurch, this person I’d taken for a man was a woman, all along. The first words she’d spoken loud enough for me to hear tearing away another misconception.

But Ape nodded and beckoned to me, and I followed him. It was a quiet walk, yet a short one. Inoichi’s room was on the same level as mine and easy to locate. Outside his door, Ape bowed and left me. I was glad of it.

It took several knocks, each louder than the last, to rouse Inoichi and bring him to the door. When he finally wrenched it open, his face registered no surprise at finding me in full gear in the hall. Dressed down to sleep with his long hair flowing over his shoulders, Inoichi’s face was no less set and determined than at any other time.

“Owl- _san_ ,” he said, taking me in with his blank, green eyes, “what can I do for you?”

“My name is Kitō, Inoichi- _sama_. May I come in; I need to talk to you.”

The man considered me, then stepped to the side to admit me. Our rooms were identical in practicality, but, compared to my room’s mess, Inoichi’s was stark. Everything in its place.

“What can I do for you, Kitō?”

I turned to find the man leaning back against his door, arms and ankles crossed and the absurd notion I was trapped there flashed across my mind. Along with the thought, if my words displeased him, I might never be let out. But, surely, those were just figments of my overwrought mental state.

Heart pounding and hands reaching to remove my mask, I hoped so. But, pulling the porcelain away, I knew it didn’t matter either way. I was going to open up to Inoichi as much as I bared my face, so he could see my bright, reddened eyes and tear-stained cheeks.

“Inoichi- _sama_ ,” I said, looking down, as I shifted from foot to foot.

He was quiet, unmoving, waiting for me to speak. Taking my lip in my teeth, I forced my eyes back up. “Inoichi- _sama_ , are you using me to get information from Monga- _sama_?”

The Head of the Analysis Team sighed, rubbing his eyes with his fingertips. “It’s our responsibility to get information from him by any means necessary, Kitō.”

I felt as though my heart fell out of me and my stomach had vacated my midriff in favor of my feet. I swayed, vision going white, then dim, then stunningly bright. My fingers flexed, worrying the air to find some hold, something to support me, but there was nothing and I fell back. Silent, I staggered to hitch up against the wall, like some trapped, caged thing, fresh tears blossoming in my eyes. “It… is true then, Inoichi- _sama_.” My words were barely there, pushing through almost unmoving, bloodless lips.

“Our ANBU have been held for a week now, there’s no telling what’s been done to them in that time. If finding them means resorting to trickery, so be it. You can blame us if you want to, Kitō, but I’m not going to ask for your forgiveness.”

My palms had been flat against the wall, bracing me up, but I moved them at these words. I used my suddenly steady hands to brush the slow tears off my cheeks, so I could face the man still leaning on the door. With care and slowness, I came off the wall. Steps measured and sedate, I went to the center of the floor to kneel and pick up the mask I had dropped there.

“I do not want your apology, Inoichi- _sama_ ,” I said, standing. “It is not something I require.”

Another sigh, preluding words I cut off with a subtle shake of my head. My own calmness disturbed me, and I wondered if it was shock. “I… am _Iryō-nin_ , I have a good understanding of my worth, Inoichi- _sama_. I… am not much of anything, I can be easily replaced, but I might have been told, Inoichi- _sama_.” Told I was nothing but another instrument of torture, a delicate instrument, instead of a blunt one, but a tool to cause pain, none the less. Something to be used without care. A thing and not a person.

Just like Monga.

We were both caught, locked in a web where there were no right moves to be made. Every struggle only enmeshed us further.

Inoichi watched me. He let his green eyes travel over me from feet to face. All the while, not moving from his recline. “Are you going to leave, then, Kitō?”

I was silent a moment, just returning his gaze, feeling how small and useless I truly was. “You do not know _Iryō-nin_ very well, Inoichi- _sama_. I will finish what I’ve started.” There seemed nothing else to say after that, and I walked toward the door. Only to pause before the Head of the Analysis Team, when he didn’t move. “Please, let me out, Inoichi- _sama_.”

My head was tilted back to look up into his face and my heart was pounding my pulse fluttering in my throat. But I gave nothing else away and Inoichi unfolded from the door, sidestepping to allow me access. My hand was reaching for the knob when his voice stopped me.

“Can you try to get some information from him, Kitō? It will be easier for you, for both of you, if you do.”

I looked back at him, my hand trembling on the metal I gripped. “I will do my duty as an _Iryō-nin_.” A pause. “I am going to see him now, Inoichi- _sama_.”

The blond man nodded. “Ape and Cobra will let you in.”

“Of course, Inoichi- _sama_ ,” I murmured. Then I turned away and left him.

The calm I had experienced in Inoichi’s room remained with me, as my heavy feet carried me back to Monga’s cell. Ape and Cobra exchanged one of their silent looks at the sight of me, but they stiffened and came to attention at my approach.

“Owl- _san_ ,” Ape acknowledged me.

“Open the door, please, Ape- _san_ ,” was all I said.

With another look at Cobra, the man did just that. I slipped my mask on as I stepped over the threshold, and I was alone with the _Iwa-nin_. Monga’s cell was dim as it always was, but on this occasion, there was no smell of fresh blood and Monga lay in what looked like actual restfulness. At least, until my light footsteps woke him.

He grunted, eyes flickering open. “Come back to try again, huh?” The words were angry, but the expression on his face changed when he saw it was me. Confusion clouded it. And doubt. As if he wondered what I would do. “Kitō?”

My legs would only carry me to his side, and my existential calm only lasted until a flash of fear crossed Monga’s facade. Then my knees unhinged, dropping me to the floor, where I doubled over, right hand holding me up, left arm wrapped around my face, so I could weep into the crock of my elbow. “I-it’s t-true,” I gasped out.

Monga’s wariness dissipated, to be replaced with weariness and some surprise. “You talked to them,” he rumbled. The sighed. “Course you did. I was an idiot to think you were anything other than what you’ve shown me. It’s a pity. I think if we weren’t enemies, we could be friends.”

“Enemies.” It was more a desperate sound than a word, and in the next instant, my shameful and seldom indulged anger flared. Tearing at me. I slammed my trembling fists onto the floor and screamed into the stone, through my tears, “Why must there be war, Monga- _sama_?! What is the point?! Why must we fight, simply because we were born in different villages?! I can’t stand it!”

“I don’t know, Kitō.” Monga’s words were a growl but laced with a soul-deep tiredness. The kind of exhaustion I heard in the voices of the rare, old _shinobi_ who came to the _Konoha Byōin_ to die when their bodies began to fail. Those who had seen too much of the world and had been hurt more often than they had found peace or sweetness. A kind of worn, frayed weariness I recognized in myself, and only wished to dispel in others because I knew the empty weight of it. An emotion which made me bite my lip, until I tasted blood, and squeezed my eyes closed when Monga went on. “Maybe I don’t want to know. It wouldn’t change anything anyway.”

The truth of it made me moan and press my masked face hard to the floor. “Can you not tell them what they want to know, Monga- _sama_? They will stop hurting you, if you do.”

It felt a betrayal to even ask such a thing, when the truth of my own purpose with Monga weighed over us, but I could not avoid uttering it all the same. Not when it was the only escape from the horror for both of us, I could see. If speaking the words made me seem a traitor to him, I would bare it to give him the possibility of respite.

Monga only sighed, deep and long. Whatever expectations of anger or disgust I might have held wiped away by that noncommittal sound. “Naw, Kitō, I can’t.”

I swallowed, shuddering a little. “But why, Monga- _sama_?”

“Come off it, Kitō,” he grunted, startling me enough I sat up to see his face, my hands shivering against my thighs. “What is it you’re fond of saying?” he went on, locking eyes with me. “I’m an _Iryō-nin_? Well, I’m an _Iwa-nin_. You mean to tell me, if our positions were reversed and it was you laying on the floor of some cell in _Iwagakure no Sato_ , you’d tell me shit?”

My hands clenched and relaxed, new tears smarting in my eyes. The repetition of it, so like when he had asked if I would still heal him if he were my torture and I his prisoner stung so impossibly. “No, Monga- _sama_. I… would not tell you anything. No matter what you did to me.”

He seemed to relax when he heard me say it. His body visibly untensing and lines going out of his face. “I’m never going to betray my village, Kitō. That’s just how it is.”

“Yes, Monga- _sama_ ,” I agreed.

There seemed little to do or say after the words passed my lips. No escape from the web enmeshing us both. I could not even find it in me to cry. The hot, stinging prick of tears in my eyes, only shortly before, had sunk back to the burn of aftereffect, and I sat. Just staring down at my hands sitting limp on my thighs.

Those hands. Such useless things they were. Unable to fulfill their purpose and relieve the suffering of my patient.

Inadequate.

Pain bubbled in me. Not the physical kind, the sort that could be healed with a sign and a flash of _chakra_. A deeper, more burdensome and agonizing pain. A mental bleed, which left me torn and wishing to bleed real blood to take away the wound in my mind. A would I knew could not be healed. All _Iryō-nin_ knew that. You could not heal a pain from a source less wound.

Shifting, absorbing this hurt, I wobbled to my feet. I had already been sitting there a long time. “I should go, Monga- _sama_.” The words were distant. There was little thought Monga would answer, beyond agreeing and telling me to get lost.

So, I was surprised to hear the depth in his voice when Monga said my name. “Kitō.”

Jerking slightly, I looked down at him. “Yes, Monga- _sama_?”

“I have a favor to ask you.”

“A f-favor, Monga- _sama_?” Something in me knew this was not well. That he should be asking something of me was dangerous and disturbing.

“Yeah,” he rumbled, his eyes soft but unwavering. “I want you to kill me, Kitō.”

A little scream tore its way out of me, and I pressed a hand over the mask, where my mouth was beneath it. But Monga only kept looking at me and going on in his low tone. Though my mind was reeling and the room around me was suddenly faint and fuzzed at the edges, I could not escape his words.

“I’m sorry to think of you being punished for it, but I know you’d make it easy, Kitō. And I can’t take much more of this.” A shimmer of unshed tears appeared in his eyes. “Be kind to me. Please.”

My hand fell away from my mask. The darkness at the edge of my vision was encroaching toward the center and another little sound was all I could manage. I tripped. Tripped stepping back because my mind had lost control on my body. In all truth, my mind had vacated me, leaving only a stunned shell to mutely shake my head in slow denial and continue backing away. Backing away, until Monga called my name.

“Kitō.”

Then, I turned and fled, the mute horror of if raising bile to choke me. I just made the hall, just managed to rip the mask from my face before I fell against the opposite wall and was sick.

Ape’s arms were around me, holding me, and he was shouting something at Cobra, but I didn’t feel his touch or hear what he said. The dark took my sight and I faded out to blessed blackness.

I was laying in my bed when I came back to myself. Someone had had the courtesy to remove the heavier parts of my gear, but I was still fully dressed on top the covers, clutching a pillow to my chest as if it were a hold on reality. For once, no one was pounding on my door, demanding admittance or summoning me away. The room was quiet, the only sign anyone had been there a plate of cold food laid out for me.

Feeling made of lead, I swung my legs over the side of the bed and sat, still holding the pillow in my arms. Much of me felt empty and lost but another part called to me loudly to relieve it. And it was this part which won out because at least the number of cuts I left on myself I could control.

But they were not many. Not then. After the second, I knew what needed to be done and I did not wish to lose time. I finished and healed myself quickly before showering, dressing, and eating. For a moment, I paused, wondering what from there. After all, I knew nothing of Inoichi and Ibiki’s plans, but a knock solved this.

Fearing I had missed my chance, I opened the door to find the young ANBU I didn’t know outside. “ANBU- _san_ ,” I acknowledged him, eyes catching on the food in his hands.

“I was asked to bring you this, Owl- _san_ ,” he returned. If he noted I was more composed than other times and already fully dressed and carrying my mask, he did not show it. “Your services will be required in a short time.”

But were not required _right then_. Informing me of what I needed to know. “Thank you, ANBU- _san_ ,” I said, stepping out and settling the mask over my face. “You may leave the food inside; I will eat it later.”

I could feel his eyes follow me, as I walked away but I did not look back to see what he did. Really, I had no care what he did. I was not a brave man. Far from it. I preferred to read of the courageous acts of others, as compared to going off and doing them myself. But sometimes there were things you had to do, and those things you did to the best of your ability.

But even that wasn’t courage. That was merely doing what needed to be done, and nothing more. I never deluded myself into thinking otherwise. Especially in that moment, I could not pretend. Though what I intended to do was a little thing, I was terrified, walking toward Monga’s door. My heart in my throat and my body tense and on edge.

The lie I had told myself at the beginning, that I could treat Monga’s wounds as if they were nothing more than the simple battle injuries I encountered at the _Konoha Byōin_ had slipped away from me quickly, before I had even met the _Iwa shinobi_ who would be my patient. But I had stubbornly and desperately clung to the lie I was not implicant in Monga’s pain. That I was separate from those who caused it and could not be implicated in that guilt. That I did not need to be present for the act, did not need to see it preformed or hear his screams, and so could not be held responsible for it, even if I attempted to make apology for it.

I could hold that lie no longer.

The moment Monga had asked me to kill him and free him from his pain, the lie had come apart. The moment I had shook my head in refusal and run from the request, the thin wall of protection I had erected around myself had shattered apart. The moment I had turned my back on Monga, and chosen not to act, I had been pinned with the truth of my own crimes. My very attempt to be pacifistic in regard to Monga’s pain vindicated it and allowed it to continue. I was not innocent, and I could no longer pretend myself to be.

“Kitō.”

Inoichi’s saying my name brought me out of my thoughts. I looked up from my feet, to see the blond man and his scared counterpart, Ibiki, grouped with Ape and Cobra before Monga’s door.

“Inoichi- _sama_ ,” I murmured, my steps slowing and coming to a halt. Though I knew my intentions, I had not anticipated meeting both the Intelligence Division Heads before entering Monga’s cell.

“You won’t be required for some time, Kitō.” Inoichi’s flat, green eyes brooked no argument.

I had none to give and no desire to even if I had. “Yes, Inoichi- _sama_ ,” I agreed, voice low. “I will be here until I am needed.”

The blond’s expression did not change, his deadpan gaze making me want to shrink. “You’re not coming in, Kitō.” This also left no room for disagreement.

Nodding, I titled my head back to look up at the man. “Then I will wait here, Inoichi- _sama_.”

“That won’t be necessary, Kitō.”

“I will do it all the same, Inoichi- _sama_.”

“Kitō-”

“You are free to have Ape- _san_ and Cobra- _san_ drag me back to my room, if you wish, Inoichi- _sama_.”

He paused, looking at me definitively. “If that’s what you want.” He turned away but Ibiki stopped him before he could open the door to Monga’s cell.

“Inoichi-”

“Don’t bother fighting with the medical _nin_ , Morino. You’ll lose.”

“I’m glad you’ve learned something about me, Inoichi- _sama_ ,” I murmured.

Ibiki looked between us, then shook his head. “Have it your way, Kitō- _san_. You won’t like what you hear.”

“I do not expect to, Ibiki- _sama_.” I said it low and steady, but I could not stop the shaking in my hands. Still, if Inoichi and Ibiki saw this sign of weakness, they did not react to it or make note of it. They turned away and left me outside in the hall.

Ape and Cobra did not seem to know what to do with me, but I paid them no mind. I settled against the wall across from Monga’s cell, one leg folded under me, the other drawn up, so that I could lean an arm on my knee, sitting there with my heart pounding up my throat, I did a strange thing. A thing I had not done with passion since I was a child and had yet to learn if there were such things as _kami_ watching over us, they were watchers only, without compassion, and did not care in the least what happened to us.

I prayed.

_Please let me have the strength._

It was a simple plea, but one I felt with the whole of my being.

_Let me be strong enough to take this._

I had agreed to become a _Yōkai-nin_ , so another of my counterparts would not have to. In so doing, I had become an accomplish to Monga’s pain. And the only one responsible who seemed to feel remorse for it. If this was so, then I had the necessity of witnessing what I was responsible for. Of not leaving Monga alone in his suffering.

Someone needed to bear witness. Someone needed to share in the pain. If only in part, it still needed to be done.

_Please let my strength be enough. It is so little, but let it be enough._

My head sank into my hands and I sat there. Stiff. Waiting.

Much of me hadn’t even known what to expect, but it was oddly quiet, sitting outside Monga’s door. Disturbingly quiet… As if… the three in the room were doing little more than talking.

I knew they were not, and it sickened me.

My body was tense and on alert when the first cry of pain rang out. My head jerked up, eyes wide and terrified, staring out the deep holes in my mask, but Ape and Cobra stood unmoved, as if they hadn’t heard the yelp from behind them. Their reticence made me bite my lip, to hold back the garbled something rising in my throat. Shivering, I let my head fall back into my hands and I stayed that way, closed in on myself, through the following silence. As well as the second cry of pain.

Just that. Two shrieks and silence. Yet, I was clutching my head and fighting back tears when I at last heard the door open. Footsteps came toward me and stopped, but I would not look up, _could_ not, until Inoichi spoke above me.

“Your services are required now, Kitō.”

Only then did my frozen stupor break. I lifted my head to see Inoichi standing tall and serene above me. Arms at his sides. Unspotted. It was Ibiki who was wiping blood from his hands unto a rag. Bright blood. Jewel like and slick.

With a garbled cry, catching on fear thick in my throat, I sprang up and dashed passed them all and into the dimness of Monga’s cell. The man was struggling to prepress his own tears, even as he cursed in angered pants into the air. His hands were pressed to his chest again, and stained red.

“Monga- _sama_!” I cried out, sliding to my knees beside him, reaching out instinctually to comfort.

“Shit! Fuck!” were his only responses, though his streaming eyes looked up at me, bare of any anger aimed toward my person. It was hard to tell if those eyes were crying actual tears, or just reflexively weeping water from the shock of shear, sudden, sharp pain. And there was little wonder why.

I jerked my hands back, just short of touching him when I registered the source of his discomfort. Monga was missing a digit from each hand. The index finger of the right and the ring finger of the left.

Pressing a hand over where my mouth was hidden behind my mask, I wailed once in despair at the sight, then again in mingled horror and mounting dizziness. And why? Because of the tidiness of it all. The cuts were clean, near surgical in their precession, while the severed fingers were laid neatly on a metal tray close by. Another _why_ with a simple answer. So, I could reattach them when I came to see to Monga.

I moaned out one more sound of desperation, then let my body take over. Let the ingrained knowledge of healing in my synapses move me in disregard to all else.

A quick sweep of a hand through Monga’s hair, which made him gasp but stop panting out curses, when I shut off all pain receptors in his brain receiving signals from his hands with a few delicate needles of _chakra_. An inspection and quick sterilization of each site before I returned each digit to its place and began the arduous process of reestablishing blood flow, reconnecting severed nerves, mending flesh, tendon, and bone.

I was silent through it all, heedless of how much _chakra_ I exerted, only removing the pain blocks I’d created when the work was done, and Monga was able to stiffly flex his fingers again. And then I was too tired to cry, too tired to talk. Only able to stare off aimlessly while Monga thrashed a little and muttered my name.

“Kitō.”

“I’m here, Monga- _sama_.” My voice was thin and strained in my own ears and Monga called me out on it.

“It doesn’t sound like it, Kitō. Seems like you’re off somewhere else.”

Stirring restlessly, I pulled myself back from the dissociation tugging at me, the dissociation and the exhaustion, to focus with effort on the other man. “Sorry, Monga- _sama_. I- Eeh! So… sorry.”

“We all are, Kitō,” he rumbled. Then he closed his eyes and breathed out a sigh. “Kitō,” he began, opening his eyes again.

He did not finish. I saw the words behind his gaze and clasped my hair, pulling my head down to my knees. “Do not ask my, Monga- _sama_! Please do not ask me! I am a healer. I… I am meant to be a healer. I never wanted to hurt anyone.”

“I think we’re passed that, Kitō.”

The words were low, but they made me twitch. Pricking me in so many ways Monga could not understand because of things Monga could not know because of things I’d left out of the story of my life I’d told him. “I can’t. Please understand, Monga- _sama_. I am _shinobi_ , but I’ve never… Never had to-”

“Kill,” he finished.

“I can’t!” The words broke out of my restraints, too much death flashing behind my eyes. Death, the thing which had stalked me all through my life. All the way from my little village, tucked at the edge of the Land of Fire, to _Konoha_ and the Academy and the Tree Leaf Hospital. Death, that inalienable thing, which had stood over me, a silent, invisible companion in my childhood home, and which had dogged my steps thereafter, only to slip into my house when I hoped to be free, and greet me as an old friend, leveling me with the force of its placid finality.

Death, in the end, was always calm. It was the dying which was raucous and life which was full of guilt and the red blood of agony.

“Please, do not ask me!” I moaned.

Monga exhaled another sigh. “Alright, Kitō.”

I sobbed, wrecked by it all, the past and the present, my fingers curling tighter in my hair. “So sorry, Monga- _sama_!”

“Cut it, Kitō,” he grunted. “Did I ask for an apology?”

Shuddering, I shook my head, my nails digging at my scalp.

Then, with nothing else to say, we sat in silence, the heaviness of our exchange hanging between us, weighing me down, until my unnoticed tears dried tacky on my face and my body almost gave into the scantiness of my remaining _chakra_ and put me to sleep. Yet, despite my second refusal, there was no blame in Monga’s voice when he spoke again.

“Time for you to get going, Kitō. You need to rest before the next time we see each other.”

“M-monga- _sama_ ,” I managed. It was a pathetic sound, and I felt equally so, releasing my hair to press my hands to the floor and kneel beside him. Twice I’d gathered calm and resolve and twice it’s been shattered with one visit to Monga and one sight of his pain. I was a healer, and I was failing. Failing again, the way I’d failed all my life, and would continue to, until it was my time to die, at last.

 _Please._ The word was distant, and I had no understanding of who I was speaking to. Certainly not some idea of the god of my youth or greater beings who would aid me. Maybe, in the end, I only spoke to myself and I knew it. _Let me have the strength._

For a second time, Monga’s fingers reached out and touched my hair with something like gentleness mixed with frustration. “Don’t make me say it again, Kitō. Beat it. Neither of us have time for this pathetic shit anymore.”

“No, Monga- _sama_ ,” I agreed, pulling my sluggish body upright. “We don’t have time.” I should have left then, should have gone without another word, but I was tired, and I did not care. I reached out and wove my hands through his, squeezing lightly but firmly. Offering silent camaraderie.

Monga looked startled at our joined hands, but he didn’t pull away. He just closed his eyes and breathed, until I took back my hands and left him.

That night, when I cut it felt like heaven.

Whatever strength I had was my own. It was not much, but it was mine. I would _make_ it enough.

With the same intent control, I used on my _chakra_ during surgeries, I forced my body to wake after a few, scant hours of sleep. If my scattered sense of time was correct, it was somewhere near dawn of some new day. I was still lacking certainty of _which_ day. It felt years since I’d left the _Konoha Byōin_ and made my way to the Intelligence Division, and I felt old. Tired and brittle and stretched to my limits. A little more and I might break.

_When it’s done._

The words drifted through me, as I picked up the porcelain mask that had become my face. When it was all done and I was released to the light of day, I could break apart. But not until then. I fastened the mask on and moved to the door, the fresh scars on my thighs rasping on the fabric of my pants. Sensitive. As though they would break open at the slightest touch. A reflection of my soul, perhaps.

Pushing past the thoughts, I went out into the hall and made my way to Monga’s cell. Ape and Cobra, the ever present, stood there, seemly unmoved. For the first time, I wondered if these were the same ANBU I had seen the first time I came to the room, or if there were different faces behind the masks. Ultimately, it did not matter.

“Have Inoichi- _sama_ and Ibiki- _sama_ come yet, Ape- _san_?” I asked.

A glance between the two ANBU. “No Owl- _san_.”

“Will they come soon, Ape- _san_?”

He nodded. “They will be here shortly.”

“Then I will wait,” I said, turning away to sit against the wall, where I had sat the previous night.

Inoichi and Ibiki found me there, perhaps twenty minutes later, my head hanging in a half doze, wrists resting on my upraised knees, and hands dangling. Their steps faltered, pulling me fully awake.

“Kitō?” Inoichi’s quiet voice asked. “You don’t have to be here for this.”

“Yes, Inoichi- _sama_ , but I will be here all the same.”

All of this was little more than repetition of what we’d said the day before. A form of reaffirmation I would not relent. And when Inoichi I saw my resolve, he nodded, turning away. “As you wish.”

Yet again, Ibiki was not so ready to leave me to my own devices. He came toward me and stopped when our feet were nearly touching, and my heart was firmly in my throat. “You should go, _Iryō-nin_. You won’t like what you hear.”

My stomach turned over. “I didn’t expect to, Ibiki- _sama_. But I will stay, unless you have Ape- _san_ and Cobra- _san_ force me to leave.” Still more repetition.

The Head of the Konoha Torture Division looked down on me, his dark eyes and scared face equal parts flat incredulity and emotionlessness. “It would be to your benefit if I did, medic.”

Chewing my lip, I let my hands slide down to grip my knees, fingers gripping tight enough to bruise. “You may do as you wish, Ibiki- _sama_.”

“Stubborn,” he noted, turning on his heel.

When the two men where in Monga’s room, I sagged, breathing ragged. My reprieve was short-lived, however. This day was nothing like the night before. There was silence only for a few moments, then there were screams. Tearing things, which stiffened me in shock, but quickly reduced me to a cringing thing, snarling my fingers in my hair, until I thought I would rip it from my head.

I had heard patients in the Tree Leaf Hospital scream before, had heard worse sounds than those in the _Konoha Byōin_ before I was seven years old in my small, unnamed village, but I had never thought a person could scream like _this_. One shriek after another, going up in octaves, until each seemed to pierce my ears with sharp needles. My teeth locked, clenching, until my jaw throbbed. My eyes shut so tight the lids squeezed tears out of me, like hands wringing a rag.

_Stop, please stop! I can’t take it! What are you doing?!_

The last was what clung to me. A slinking horror climbing me in grasping millimeters of coldness. _What are you doing?!_

_Stop! Make it stop!_

Blood dripped out from under my mask. It ran from my teeth-shredded lip, and down my chin, to fall in slow, unnoticed droplets. Other warmth blossomed and spread in my hair from where my nails dug at my scalp.

_This has to stop!_

But it did not. My sense of the flow of time was skewed by my agonized inability to move. However long it really was, the time seemed doubled and I was a panting wreck when at last Monga’s door opened and Inoichi and Ibiki stepped out.

“Kitō.”

Inoichi’s soft utterance of my name broke me. With a cry, I sprang up and dashed past him, not acknowledging his presence in anyway but to brush by him. I could not. Inside the shadowed aperture of Monga’s door, moans and wrung out whines of pain still sounded.

_What have you done?!_

This thought pounded in my wild heartbeat. It made me reckless and off balance. I stumbled through the door, my hands connecting with and slipping off the doorframe, as I all but fell through into a space reeking of the bitter metal scent of blood. Monga’s cell was dim, as always, but that nauseating smell assaulted me and led my gaze with unerring accuracy to where the _Iwa-nin_ lay. And uncaring the door was still open, uncaring Inoichi and Ibiki were still outside, I covered my masked mouth with my hands and screamed at the sight, as I had so many times before.

In the hall the sound of retreating footsteps paused, hesitated, then went on to dwindle and be cut off by Ape easing the door shut behind me. Cutting off the light and leaving me alone with Monga in the shadow-cluttered room. The _snick_ of the latch released whatever was holding my feet captive and I ran to fall down beside Monga with another cry.

Then, I was silent. Too lost in administering healing and snipping off his ability to feel pain to articulate any of the raging, reeling feelings rampaging drunkenly through my thought processes.

They’d flayed him.

Neat, orderly, symmetrical swathes of flesh had been peeled from his back, sides and abdomen in careful, near artful designs. It was this fact, this clear thought-out, pre-meditated brutalness, which made me wish to vomit. Not even the blood, hot, slick, and pungent under my hands or the singular disgust of the sight of another human shorn of his skin could compare to the horror of the clam slowness, which had to have gone into such a thing. Suffering made art and a matter of worship was tantamount to the religion of the god Jashin, but to see a thing of that nature again in the bowls of _Konoha_ was a horror like no other.

 _This_ was necessity? _This?!_

What had been done was more than I could heal on my own, with _chakra_ reserves running to the dregs. At the end of my endurance, all I could do was encourage the growth of thin, new flesh, and cover the tender areas with thick, white bandages.

Monga was quiet while I worked, aside from the rattle of uneasy breathing. This was no wonder. Though Monga had stopped moaning and whimpering when I’d relieved him of the need to feel pain, he had dropped into deep, overwrought sobs to compensate. But these had lasted bare moments, as they sapped the last of the large man’s energy, and he had slipped into a form of semi consciousness in which he jerked and twitched while I worked. His eyes occasionally flickered open to look at me, dull and unseeing, before fluttering closed again, but that was all.

We were both of us spent.

When I had done all I could, I took pain medication from my supplies and turned back to Monga. Brushing my fingers lightly through his hair, to rouse him, and calling his name, “Monga- _sama_. Monga- _sama_.”

The _Iwa-nin’s_ eyes opened, but I wasn’t sure if he actually saw me, as I put the pills to his lips. “I need you to swallow these, Monga- _sama_. I have to undo my pain inhibiting _jutsu_. It isn’t good to tamper with the brain’s neurological functions for too long.”

Those dull eyes closed but his pale lips moved. “Sure, Kitō,” he murmured.

I let the medication have time to spread through his system, then I eased my _chakra_ needles out, giving Monga back his ability to feel. It was plain to see when the pain struck. Despite the medication I had given him, his body twitched, and his face contorted, jaw clenching.

My hand was already in his hair, after removing my _jutsu_ , unthinkingly, only stunned and tired, I slid my fingers through the brown locks. Wanting only to sooth. “Rest, Monga- _sama_ ,” I said.

Monga gave no answer, not even a grunt, and I offered no futile words of comfort. A moment more with my fingers in his hair and I stumbled away, out the door and passed Ape and Cobra, to the sparse comfort of my own room.

Much of me wanted to forget, to lose myself in the cutting of my own skin, but sitting on my bathroom floor, I could not bring myself to do the thing. I just sat. My hands hanging limp and useless between my thighs, while I stared at nothing.

So many lies and so many tangled duties.

I’d walked away from the _Konoha Byōin_ expecting I’d reached the end of my path as an _Iryō-nin_ , expecting to go off on some mission and die. Only to never leave the village. To go no further than the Intelligence Division. Yet, for all of that, I’d found worse things than meeting an end I’d stopped fearing sometime in the past I could no longer remember. Stopped fearing, perhaps, when I was still a child.

Eyes unfocusing, I moaned and bent until my face was between my knees.

Worse than death, I’d found guilt. Guilt compounded upon what I already carried in my heart for wrongdoings I could never atone for. Guilt because I could not deny my willing, if coerced, participation in Monga’s pain. It was my duty as a _Konoha shinobi_ , but that did not pardon me or expunge my crime.

_Responsible._

Yet, held bound to more than the life of one man.

_Responsible._

I was responsible.

Hound. Lynx. Viper. Crane.

Faceless ANBU I had never met, but whose lives were bound to mine.

And… responsible… for…

Monga…

An _Iwa shinobi_ I refused to see as an enemy for the simple crime of being born in a hidden village not my own.

I had a responsibility to them all, and I had been lying to myself in thinking I could hold that responsibility merely by sitting outside Monga’s door. Doing such a thing was the same as doing nothing, and if I did nothing, they were all going to die.

No matter the torture Inoichi and Ibiki subjected Monga to, he would never give them the information they wanted. But if the two heads of the Intelligence Division continued as they were going, Monga would break. Break in a way which had nothing to do with giving up or giving in, and everything to do with being shoved over an invisible barrier into a place where the mind could just no longer take it.

And that would be all.

An end.

But a useless one. One which rendered all that had been done so utterly pointless.

 _Something_ needed to be done. _It_ had to _stop_. If all were going to die on this course, then a _different_ avenue had to be taken, even…

_Even…_

A desperate whine came out of me, and I wrapped my arms around my legs to draw them close to my chest.

Even if it meant I would have to suffer. To be punished.

But, in the end, what was the life of one medical _nin_ worth?

Not much of anything.

I could be sacrificed if it meant at least some of the suffering in this helpless situation could be averted.

There was so little I could do, so little… But what I was capable of, I had to do.

Still, I hesitated. I sat curled in on myself, naked limbs tucked up against my torso, while I shuddered on the cold tiles. Sat there for some time, until I was stiff and oh so tired. Yet, despite this, I did pull myself to my feet.

Detached, I showered away my aches and dressed in my ANBU gear. Then I went to my supply bundle and picked up a thing I’d almost forgotten about. The fragment of _kunai_ I had pulled out of Monga’s shoulder. I let it lay in my palm a moment, studying its edges, then tucked in away in a pocket of my pants. Just a random talisman. Next, from a drawer, I retrieved a blank scroll and tucked this beside the bit of metal. The last thing I took was my mask. It was funny how the porcelain no longer seemed to weigh on me. No longer felt like a barrier.

It was only painted ceramic. It held no meaning and no more fear. _When you find your purpose, you walk straight, Kitō._ Someone had told me that once, and it was true. I’d followed the words all the way to _Konoha_ when I thought my heart would break and my feet would fail, and I followed them to Monga’s cell.

Ape and Cobra came to attention at the sight of me, casting each other one of their meaning-filled glances, but I had no doubt they would let me in. It was what they were ordered to do. “I’ve come to see Monga- _sama_ , Ape- _san_ ,” I said when I was close. “Please open the door.”

“Of course, Owl- _san_ ,” he responded.

I felt my heart flutter, as I walked into the room. Monga lay, swaddled in the bandages I’d wrapped him in, his breathing slightly easier than when I’d left him. He didn’t react to my presence, until I settled near him, though. Then he grunted and opened pain clouded eyes, then.

“Hey, Kitō,” he rumbled.

“Monga- _sama-_ ” Words seemed to stick in my throat. How did one say what I wished to express? How did one articulate what I wished to say without stumbling? One did not, I decided. One could trip and plod and hope for understanding, and that was all.

_But…_

My hand climbed to my face and crawled over the mask there. Trembled at my thoughts. But one could not hide if they dared to _try_. Such things were between two people, not between one man and one faceless phantom.

Slowly, I reached behind my head and undid the straps holding my mask in place. With the other hand I took the porcelain away from my face and set the mask on the stone floor with a subtle click. Then I hung my head, my fingers twitching on the painted surface of the ANBU mask. Here was yet another betrayal of my village. I was only part of the ANBU force by chance, by strange necessity of their _needing_ an _Iryō-nin_ , yet I was still bond by their rules and removing the mask was as forbidden as saying my name aloud.

Monga knew it as well. His gaze sharpened. “What are you doing, Kitō?” It was near a growl. A tried, hopeful sound.

It hurt me so.

Delicately, gracefully, I let my fingertips meet the floor and slide over it, as I eased myself down into a full bow. A penance for a forgiveness I could not even ask for. “I- I-”

“Are you going to be kind to me, Kitō?” The words were exhausted. Thread bare. Unraveling about the edges.

“Yes.” My own word was strained, coming up out of a constricted throat. “I won’t let them hurt you anymore, Monga- _sama_.”

Saying the last, I pulled myself back off the floor. Relief was etched in every line on Monga’s face. Relief and other things. He looked at me with pity and regret, which only made my pain worse. “I’m sorry, Kitō.”

“As am I, Monga- _sama_.”

Yet, whatever grief the _Iwa-nin_ held, he didn’t pay any attention when I drew out the scroll and lay it open to the side. Only reacting when I reached out for him by shutting his eyes and releasing a soft sigh. The sound of a person getting ready to sleep.

It was amazing how easy it was. How easy my fingers slid through his hair. How my _chakra_ intertwined with his, as it penetrated his skull, to stroke over his mind. Fluttering over this part and that, ensuring he would feel no pain, telling his body to sleep, to dream something pleasant before it surrounded his hippocampus and began inserting spikes of _chakra_ in precise places. Just here and just there.

Cutting.

Dividing.

Extracting.

I knew when it was done when the dream Monga was experiencing went out. Just popped like a soap bubble. No fade out, on soft drift, just a sharp snap and gone. Nothing left but afterimage on my eyes.

Then, I took my hands away, rolled up the scroll, and sat with it in my lap, staring off at nothing. I felt as blank and empty as unmarked paper. Numb. Perhaps, shocked by my very ability to do such a thing and inability to cry for it. My eyes ached and burned, but it was as if I had shed all my tears for Monga already, and there were none left for that moment. But it did not matter. What good would they do any longer?

None.

There was nothing to do but wait, and the waiting was not overlong. A half hour, perhaps an hour, and Monga’s door opened, flooding the space with light from the hall.

“Owl- _san_ -” the ape masked ANBU began, only to cut himself off of a sudden.

I only spared the man a glance over my shoulder, to see him standing stiff and rigid, just in the entrance, before turning back to where Monga lay. Still. “You should get Inoichi- _sama_ , Ape- _san_ ,” I said softly.

There was the sound of an indrawn breath and a low curse, then his footsteps retreated, and the door closed, shutting out the light. For the first time since I had begun healing Monga’s wounds, I heard the lock turn and click into place with me inside the room. That did not matter either.

Monga would do me no harm.

It was scant minutes before Inoichi came swiping into the cell, a calm, blond thunderhead, threatening wrath without the need for angry wind or rain. But, at first, there was nothing for him to see to push him over into that wrath, beyond me, bare-faced and silent. Monga was already awake, sitting up against his lingering pain, and blinking dark, confused eyes about the room.

Inoichi took us both in, his flat, green eyes hard and cautious on my unmasked face, as I swayed to my feet and came toward him. “Kitō,” he said slowly. “What’s going on?” No pretense, no _Owl_. Just stark recognition I had betrayed my own identity.

Odd how if that were all I had done, I would be more fearful. Would have had my heart beating up into my throat and a dizziness which swamped me. But having done my deed, nothing could disturb the muteness in my soul. Nothing could harm me or touch me with emotion. I was stone.

Coming to a halt a few feet from Inoichi, I wavered there, at the edge of my own exhaustion. “Neither of our services are required here anymore, Inoichi- _sama_ ,” I managed, head tilted up to meet his gaze.

Something in those green eyes flickered with unease. Making me wonder if he suspected he had pushed something too far. “What are you talking about, Kitō?”

“Who are you?” The question was low and perplexed and not framed in Monga’s usual tones. No rumble or grunt or waspish undercurrent laced the words. Just slight, but growing concern, and ingrained tiredness.

Inoichi’s eyes locked on the man over my head, even as I answered the Yamanaka’s question unflinchingly. “I erased Monga- _sama’s_ memories.”

The head of the Analysis Team refocused on me in an instant. “What?”

“I-” The word came out, the beginning of a repeat of my previous statement, but it was clear the man did not need my repetition and took me at my word.

He grabbed double handfuls of my flak jacket at the throat and slammed me into the wall. “Do you have any idea what you’ve done?! Our ANBU are going to die because of you!”

My head rocked back, clicking against the stone and making me see stars, but I hardly felt the shoot of pain riding down my spine, as I mechanically lifted the scroll in my hand and offered it. “Yes, Inoichi- _sama_ , I do know what I’ve done. I performed a purge and transfer _jutsu_ I designed on Monga- _sama_. I eradicated his memories from his brain, even while I transferred and recorded them in this scroll. The information you want is here.”

The blond man’s eyes fell to the scroll. For a tense moment we stood like that, our bodies pressed close together, then his fingers untangled from my ANBU gear and took the scroll. No longer supported, my legs gave way and I sank bonelessly down the wall to the floor, where I sat in a tangle. My head tilted back in order to see Monga around Inoichi’s legs. The _Iwa-nin_ had watched the exchange with knitted brows and incomprehension.

This too didn’t matter.

Above me, Inoichi’s hands were trembling, rattling the paper burned and tattooed with neat, black characters. It was some time before he rolled it up and pulled in a shuddering breath. “Ape. Cobra,” he called. “Place Kitō under arrest and escort him to a cell, until an investigation into his actions can be concluded.”

For the first time, I saw the two ANBU at the door, outlined by the outer light. They hesitated a moment, then moved to do as ordered. I didn’t resist when they reached for me, didn’t mind when they restrained my hands, only walked with them. My steps leading me to my own cell under the Intelligence Division.

I was transferred several times over the course of what I took for six weeks or more. It was difficult to keep track of time, until I was moved to a bank of actual prison cells with bars looking out into a hallway and a barred window too high up to see out of, but which at least told me if it was day or night.

I didn’t mind any of it. Not even the boredom. Much of me was still numb inside. I did not feel. I ate and I slept, and I watched the sunlight play on the walls.

Waiting.

It was Inoichi who came to me, in the end. Speaking low to my guards, until they unlocked and rolled back my cell door for the blond to enter. I’d been sitting on my bed, so he took the single chair, studying me thoughtfully.

I looked back carelessly, acknowledging him at the last. “Hello, Inoichi- _sama_.”

“Hello, Kitō,” he returned. “I’ve come to talk to you about several things.”

I nodded wordlessly and he went on. “The _jutsu_ you used on Monga. You said you designed it yourself.”

“Yes, Inoichi- _sama_. It was rather simple. But I will not use that _jutsu_ again.”

“It’d be useful in the Intelligence Division, Kitō.”

And there it was. The answer to why he’d asked the question. They wanted to use my _jutsu_ on others like Monga. “I will never show anyone how to perform that _jutsu_. Not even if you torture me, Inoichi- _sama_.”

His jaw flexed, clenching, but he offered me a curt nod. Not even bothering to question my resolve. Maybe something in my steadiness told him not to bother, or perhaps he had learned something of _Iryō-nin_ , at last.

We were quiet a while, and I looked down to where my hands lay limp on my thighs, the fingers curled and palms facing up. I hadn’t felt the need to cut during my incarceration. I felt so little. But… “Inoichi- _sama_ , what happened to Monga- _sama_?”

The other man was silent, until I looked up at him, meeting his unreadable, green eyes with my own, pained, dry ones. I had felt the need to cry as little as the need to cut. Yet, my eyes still ached in despite of it. I wondered if Inoichi saw the emptiness behind my gaze and what he made of it if he did. Whatever the Head of the Analysis Team thought of me he only took me in a moment before giving me what I’d asked for.

“Monga was kept in the Intelligence Division for another week, while he was examined by a psychologist and a team of medical _nin_. Ultimately, the _Iwa-nin_ was ruled incapable of being held responsible for any actions he’d taken against _Konoha_ and only a minor threat to the village and its people, as, though he is still able to perform _ninjutsu_ , he no longer knows how or remembers where his allegiance lies. Given that, Monga was moved to the secure wing of the _Konoha Byōin_. I hear he is being looked after by several of your fellow team members serving under Captain Hōshō.”

Relief and something else twisted in me, as the image of Hakui flashed across my mind. Yes, she would be there. Perhaps with Mitate or Migaki or even Mogusa. Would they know what my involvement was in Monga’s condition? It was unlikely they would have been told more than they needed to know, from a medical standpoint, but they were _Iryō-nin_ and they knew me well. They would guess more than they were ever told.

Another twist of that bitter, unknown thing in my heart and I recognized it for shame. And loneliness. I was branded a _Yōkai-nin_ forever. And this was as it should be. I was not the same as I had been when I left the Tree Leaf Hospital so long ag…

Weariness settled on me, and I let my eyes rove and run over Inoichi. Slow and distant, I gave voice to the other question lingering in me. “And the ANBU, Inoichi- _sama_?”

The green eyes flickered. “Our ANBU were recovered. ANBU code name Hound, ANBU code name Lynx, and ANBU code name Viper are still being treated for extensive injuries. ANBU code name Crane was found alive, with the rest of her team, but died during transport back to _Konoha_.”

I nodded, then let my glance fall back to my hands. So incapable, those hands. “Thank you, Inoichi- _sama_.”

“Is there anything else you want to ask me about, Kitō?”

“No, Inoichi- _sama_.”

“Not even about your own situation, Kitō.”

I was surprised by how gentle the words were, but I did not look up, only folding my hands up and turning them over on my thighs. “I imagine I will be punished, Inoichi- _sama_. It is alright.”

When the blond spoke, his words were still gentle, striving at being kind. “Danzō Shimura has been calling for your head on a plate for treason. He wants a private trial before the _Hokage_ and the harshest possible sentence.”

“Execution,” I said the word tonelessly. It was a seldom called for punishment, in the Hidden Leaf, but not unheard of for matters of defection and other such crimes among the ANBU and elite _shinobi_. Given I had been working under ANBU credentials, what Inoichi said was no more than what I’d expected.

He confirmed it with his next word. “Yes.” The other man shifted, leaning toward me. “However, in light of the fact it is obvious you had no intention of hiding or destroying the intelligence you gathered from Monga, and your actions resulted in the successful rescue of our captured ANBU, I petitioned the Third for a lighter form of discipline. It isn’t sure, but Lord Hiruzen is inclined to agree with me. You’re likely to spend several months in prison for insubordination, before being released back to your duties at the _Konoha_ Hospital, under probation and the watch of your caption, Hōshō, but nothing worse.”

I looked up at the other man, movements slow, a burn taking up residence behind my eyes. “Alright, Inoichi- _sama_.”

He gaged me, attempting to read if there was anything behind my calm, disinterest in my own fate. Whatever he found didn’t seem to please him. With a sigh, the Head of the Analysis Team stood and clapped me on the shoulder in passing. “Take care, Kitō. I’ll visit you again.”

“Alright, Inoichi- _sama_ ,” I repeated, as he exited, and my guards rolled my barred door shut behind him. I sat still and silent until the sound of his footsteps disappeared down the hall and my guards had vanished back to where they sat, gently murmuring to one another. Then I wrapped my arm around my face and cried into it. Sobbing out the first tears and the first deep emotion I’d felt since finding Monga flayed. The force of it bent me double over my knees and left me blind because I knew, no matter what they did to me or how long they kept me there, it would never make up for what I had done.

**Author's Note:**

> My soul, my irreparable wrong.  
> My guilt, my irrevocable being.  
> This is all there is.
> 
> -Anonymous
> 
>   
> And I'd give up forever to touch you  
> 'Cause I know that you feel me somehow  
> You're the closest to heaven that I'll ever be  
> And I don't want to go home right now
> 
> And all I can taste is this moment  
> And all I can breathe is your life  
> And sooner or later it's over  
> I just don't wanna miss you tonight
> 
> And I don't want the world to see me  
> 'Cause I don't think that they'd understand  
> When everything's meant to be broken  
> I just want you to know who I am
> 
> And you can't fight the tears that ain't coming  
> Or the moment of truth in your lies  
> When everything feels like the movies  
> Yeah you bleed just to know you're alive
> 
> And I don't want the world to see me  
> 'Cause I don't think that they'd understand  
> When everything's meant to be broken  
> I just want you to know who I am
> 
> [Iris - Goo Goo Dolls](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NdYWuo9OFAw)
> 
> This salty ball of angst and glitter is an original fiction author and fan fiction writer, who literally lives for comments and reader interaction. Even if this is nothing but inarticulate vowel screams, lol. He exist on a flotilla of social media, separated into a wide array writery things.
> 
> If you are crazy enough to want to see what I'm writing on any given day, and maybe try tempting me into writing something specific, feel free to join me in my personal writing Discord [Midway](https://discord.gg/jsQw96p), or friend me on Discord at LeoOtherland#7066 if you would rather chat one on one.
> 
> On Facebook I can be located on my [author page](https://www.facebook.com/LeoOtherland/) for all things original fiction, or in the [AO3 Armada group](https://www.facebook.com/groups/601270063618951) for all things fan fiction.
> 
> On [Twitter](https://twitter.com/RoseOfOtherLand) or [Tumbler](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/leootherlands) I primarily run with the fan fiction crowd and I seldom post and/or tweet anything, but if you want to drop me a line, I am always up for a chat.


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